In pursuit of unmatched wealth and power its internal organs have been infected by the malignancies of greed, arrogance and corruption, spreading from coast to coast, a haze of barrenness infiltrating every city and every town, afflicting a society 300 million strong, slowly yet invariably eroding the foundations of an Empire on fast-forward time, as if America's domination has been accelerated, her reign compressed and her demise made absolute. Yet in her accelerated cycle can civilization once more bear witness that while the greatness of man may build empires, it is the deep flaws inherent in our nature that crumbles them as well.
What the genius of humankind helps construct the vices of the human condition will assuredly destroy, for what is history but a written record of our greatness always decimated by our weaknesses, of our vices, corruption and incurable penchant for death, violence and destruction as always laying waste to the marvels humankind is capable of constructing? What is history if not a linear pattern, repeated over and over and over again, regardless of time, location or of cultural differences, of the triumphs of humankind trumped and squashed by the mammalian passions and emotions inherent in our primate species, of our species taking a leap forward only to have us take two leaps back?
The story of America, whether as Empire or as superpower, is one of man's penchant for absolute power, and how that power corrupts absolutely, as always without fail, along with man's quest to continuously expand the power, wealth and reach of the tribe, usually at the behest of the leader(s), as always thanks to our inability to control our ingrained mammalian behaviors and psychology that, inasmuch as we would like to discard from our condition, remain deeply entrenched in our psyches and in our human-primate nature. We cannot compete with millions of years of evolution, after all, an existence based on epochs of survival and natural selection, on instincts and behaviors molded over eons that eventually determined who and what we are today. From our deep psychological need for a hierarchical structure in our societies, one based on rank or caste or socioeconomic status, to our almost universal acceptance - indeed a disturbing desire - in delineating power to an alpha male among us, usually chosen or tolerated as group leader, to the innate quest for wealth and power in men in order to attract the best possible mate for procreation to the primordial need to belong to a tribe, today categorized by the nation-state, to the insatiable protection of and desire for territory and its resources, our primate-mammalian behavior dominates every aspect of the human condition.
For what are we in reality - without the smoking mirrors of religion and the delusions of ego by which we see and judge ourselves - but a mammal that triumphed over all other hominid species, when such was the reality on the planet, destroying and making extinct all potential competitors through the violence and viciousness that are part of our nature and that we have seemingly perfected to an art form, until we alone remained, roaming the lands of Earth, in time becoming like locusts decimating forests and jungles and untold number of species in our quest towards becoming rulers of the planet? What are we if not a species born in violence and evolved through violence, forever bedeviled by our inability to control our animal urges, behaviors and instincts, always enslaved to the emotions of greed, ego, competition and selfishness, easily corrupted by the aura of money, materialism and wealth, frustrated by the always strong urge to copulate, controlled by our hunger to procreate, to attain the power and domination and wealth needed to successfully attract a mate and inevitably pass on our genes?
What is history if not a case study in the human condition, of our inability to cease war, violence, tribalism, destruction and of our inability to control the corruption spawned by power or the fragility of our psyches? What we are, is a species descended from the always brutal and difficult animal world, where survival is a matter of life and death, where selfishness is to live another day, where procreation is the driving force, where our greatest traits and most debilitating vices were first engendered and molded. Where we rose from and remained for hundreds of thousands of years determined who we are today, for 200,000 years as homo sapiens and 10,000 years of civilization cannot compete with millions of years of mammalian evolution nor millions of years of acquired behaviors, psychology, instincts and emotions that have contributed towards creating the most dominant species the world has every known. It is through studying Empire, therefore, that humanity, and civilization, can best be understood, for within its borders lies the greatness of man as well as the worst in the human condition, the reality of our enslavement to our evolutionary psychology as well as the necessary clues to escape our animal bondage.
What is Empire if not the basic human tribe on steroids, a case study into the success and failures of a collection of individuals comprising a vast population that has risen to the top of the human pyramid? Tribes of the past, bonded by and based on blood, ethic or religious similarities, competed with each other for marginal swaths of territory and resources, as far as small segments of land was concerned, relative to the size of Earth. Usually competition among rivals could be peaceful, based on diplomacy, or violent, based on the perpetual state of war humans have always lived in.
As humans grew in numbers so too did the size and numbers of tribes, invariably putting greater and greater stress on both land and resources, eventually creating a push phenomenon whereby weaker, less sophisticated, perhaps smaller tribes, unable to compete with the more powerful, larger ones, were forced out of the tract of land they inhabited. The strongest of these tribes usurped the land and resources they wanted and needed, usually by invasion or conquest, or by assimilation of the lesser, weaker tribe. These strong tribes thereby pushed weaker ones into new lands, as well as those new tribes created through discontent or due to differences among peers.
The push factor among tribes, as well as the search for lands full of resources and sustenance, gave rise to human migration patterns that eventually settled all of Africa, Asia, Europe, Oceania and the Americas. Over millennia, as tribes settled, grew distant to each other (both genetically and environmentally) and procreated within close genetic blood lines, similar ethnic traits appeared, showcasing homogeneity among populations, whether by the inter-breeding of close blood lines or by environmental evolutionary causes. Over generations various genetic mutations appeared, giving populations the distinctive ethnic or racial appearance we see today. It was the proximity of both genetic lines and tribal lands that created homogeneous peoples in various regions of the planet. It was the vast distances of Earth, or its naturally inaccessible barriers, that allowed multiple tribes to possess the genetic diversity we see today. Indeed, it could be said that Earth, with its continents and natural barriers, is to humanity what the Galapagos Islands are to its birds and lizards. Each region created its own ethnicities, based on distance, genetics and environment.
Once the available land's resources and its habitability became compromised, a tribe would simply move to new land, either bumping into another tribe, where, depending on the size and power of the group, would proceed to invade, wage war, conquer and/or expel (assimilate) the new rival, or, if the tribe was stronger than the invaders, then sidestepping the territory and finding virgin land somewhere else, which would eventually over time run out of resources or be overrun by other tribes. In much the same way our closest primate relatives, chimpanzees, as well as many other mammal species, establish territories that are zealously protected. Indeed, we as humans are extremely territorial, as much as any other mammal, as can be witnessed by the endless conflict over land and resources since we left the jungles of East Africa that has oftentimes resulted in brutal warfare, mass murder, ethnic cleansing and untold levels of human wickedness.
It is humans, in groups or tribes or clans or families or city-states or nation-states or Empires, which compete with other rival groups for the Earth's finite lands and resources, all for the greatest game on the planet, that instinct all Earth's organisms possess, that drive called survival. It is in the world of nature, of which our species has been a part of for millions of years - to be distinguished from that of civilization - where survival of the fittest decides winner and loser, life and death, prosperity and ruin, and where natural selection oftentimes creates brutal and violent competition among rivals, along with all corresponding survival behaviors, that elevates surviving into a joust where living one more day is the ultimate reward. The world of nature is harsh, difficult and oftentimes violent, yet it is the rule rather than the exception, where all of Earth's organisms gather to give great balance to the planet's living world. It is from this context, and this reality, from which our evolutionary psychology rises, where our ingrained behaviors evolved and our undeniable penchant for control of both land and resources developed.
In Empire's Shadow can Humanity be Seen
Throughout human history Empires have risen to the zenith of human achievement, becoming a regional hegemony unmatched by rivals, for years enjoying the glory of power and wealth, the torch of human greatness passed onto its people, only to eventually and inevitably fall to the embedded vices of the human condition, becoming the spoiled, gluttonous, arrogant, greedy, warmongering and deluded society whose foundations crumble below the weight of corruption and decay, creating over time the nadir of our worst failures, a failed state.
With the death of one Empire another will always be waiting in the wings, eager to take its place among the great monuments of civilization, ready to be crowned the next step in our evolution as a civilization, ready to partake in its journey through Empire's stages, rising, maturing and falling, traversing from the principled and humble to the debased and arrogant, once more falling for the trap of humankind's making, destroying itself from within at the hands of its own hubris and corruption. This Empire will in time, guided by the deeply flawed hands of man and by the unshakable reality that is the human condition, inevitably crumble to the ground, crashing upon its foundations, assisted in its downfall by the inertia that is humankind's embedded mammalian psychology.
The inability of man to escape the instincts of the animal world, with our hunger for survival, of power and wealth, our pursuit of domination, comfort and territory, our bondage to ego and competition, with our drive, whether conscious or subconscious, of pursuing and securing the best genes for procreation - just as all living organisms are designed to do - have condemned us to repeat history over and over, forever to disregard its most valuable lessons, forever to remain adrift in the ocean of delusion clinging to the raft of our hubristic and self-deluded greatness.
Our species is impotent to the winds of change for we are and forever will remain slaves shackled to the demons of the human condition, the gumbo of our evolutionary tinkering deeply ingrained into our psyches, from our inception as a species making us who and what we are, making us highly susceptible to the debasement and vices prevalent in modern civilization, especially modern forms of Empire. Unable to see past the foggy mirror placed in front of our eyes by theology and our deluded ego, hypnotized we remain to our self-aggrandized beliefs, destined to forever believe ourselves god-like creatures whose mastery is unrivaled, our denial blinding us to a reality altogether different.
Ironically, the same mammalian instincts, behaviors and psychology that enabled us to become the dominant species on Earth, enabling us to lay claim as rulers over all things living at the expense of all forms of life on the planet, will invariably also help seal our fate, for what we once did to others, and today do to the planet, will inevitably one day in the not to distant future be done to us. We are human, after all, all too human, embedded in our being the seeds of destruction and brutality and violence that for too long been the hallmarks of our existence, for millennia decimating the planet, its living organisms and ourselves.
It is in Empire's decline, therefore, that we can see how the human heaven eventually becomes its hell, how our greatest triumphs become our greatest defeats, how Empire's virtues steadily become its vices and how our fragile psyches fall prey, as they always do, to Empire's follies. What man does at its height and full glory, at a time when the baskets are full, springs are flowing and minds are at ease, can tell us who and what we truly are, helping us decipher the human condition, for if when times are good we invariably descend into the ominous caverns of human vice and wickedness, what does that say about us as a species?
Empire's Malignancies
It is inside the parameters of the lands called the United States that the downfall of humanity's latest foray into Empire can readily be seen. Growing in size and proportion every passing year, her decline, while not imminent or yet seen, can nonetheless be felt, upon closer inspection, much like the movement of the winds or the arrival of the tides. Her destiny has always been foretold, much like every past attempt at human Empire, for nothing is as predictable as the human condition and our species' inability to defeat the hands of evolution. In the delusion of our minds Empire seems like the chosen kingdom of the gods, yet in reality is but the consequence of our mammalian pathology, a quest achieved by gang warfare, violence, death, lust for territory, greed, arrogance, corruption of morality, hunger for resources, power, control and the always hovering ego.
The Pax Americana is as Empires have always been, growing internally at first thanks to comparative advantages in technology, population, philosophy or resources, flourishing regionally thanks to increased power and wealth, until that time that her belly overflows her waistline and the greed of man becomes the pursuit of imperial hegemony. To appease the growing hunger of her leaders for power and of her people for increased living standards expansion of her borders becomes state policy. Thus, Manifest Destiny is birthed and the hand of god is proclaimed to be the guiding force empowering the quest for expansion onward, thereby granting forgiveness, and an excuse, to the litany of crimes against humanity that is logically to follow.
Born through Manifest Destiny, growing and expanding, like any Empire before, through war, violence, genocide and ethnic cleansing of peoples whose lands she coveted, her appetite for land leading to rape, pillage and stolen territories, to the decimation and suffering of millions of indigenous peoples, enriching and gorging herself through the natural resources prevalent in the lands she stole in pursuit of Empire, her power and wealth growing exponentially through the mass exploitation and toil, not to mention the unpaid blood, sweat and tears of African enslavement, America set her sails on the course to hegemony, using the blueprints of Empires past to transform herself into a modern incarnation of Rome.
Ethnocentrically centered on her Anglo-Saxon pedigree, America would, in pursuit of possession of lands from Atlantic to Pacific, imitate her English predecessor, embarking on a Crusade of brutal warfare against America's native and darker skinned peoples, decimating millions of human beings through destruction of cultures, decimation of societies, rape of women, pillage of land, genocide, ethnic cleansing and the devastation of a continent at one time fluid with heterogeneous cultures and peoples. It would be during her wars against the native peoples of America that the Empire's xenophobia, racism, antipathy and hatred of those whose skin is the color of the land would be cultivated and conditioned into her population, to remain in perpetuity, transcending time and space, generation after generation.
It would be her sense of superiority over these "different" peoples that would nurture in America's evolving character the belief that their death, cleansing and destruction - whether in the Great Plains or Southeast Asia or Latin America or Mesopotamia or among her very own urban jungles - would be of no consequence or importance, their death a product of expanding the Empire, their suffering seen as no more significant than that of an animal. In the quick span of time and conquest, between and during the intervals of constant warfare, those massacred and cleansed were seen as subhuman, savages and barbarians whose death and tragedy at the hands of Empire's army were logical consequences to resisting Manifest Destiny and god's chosen state.
Of course the torture, dehumanization, rape, pillage, brutal occupation, murder, disappearances, decimation of human rights, false imprisonment, tyranny and utter contempt for human life prevalent in America's disasters in Iraq or Afghanistan are not exclusive to the last few years. Rather, it has been methodical and systematic, an unending product of expanding Empire and of maintaining control over her vast fiefdoms throughout the globe, lasting over decades of time, past, present and future, afflicting millions from almost every land, of every religion, of every ethnic origin. It is the nature of Empires, and thus of humankind, from those in Mesopotamia, Asia and Africa and Mesoamerica, from Sumer to Babylon, from Egypt to Greece to Rome, from the Mayas to the Inca to the Aztec, from the Ottomans to the Persians, from the English to the Spanish.
The brutality of the Pax Americana, with the stench of death, indigence and suffering apparent everywhere it lays its omnipresent grip, is the result of policies created and enforced towards maintaining wealth and power, of expanding interests and of retaining control over the vast sphere of influence. It is the result of Empire building and of curtailing rivals and rebellions to its hegemony, of retaining for both the masses and the Establishment the greatest standard of living the world has ever seen. For the Empire, it is standard operating procedure, becoming the modus operandi of presidents, of time periods, of education or of generations born and dead, a policy to be continued until decline and fall or until its philosophy is altered from within.
To the heathens whose skin was and is the color of the earth, Manifest Destiny did not end with the extermination of the Native Indians. It has continued mercilessly, devastating millions of people whose only crime is inhabiting lands whose resources the Empire covets and whose slave labor her population depends on for their ever-expanding waistlines their voracious greed and ever-demanding standards of living. Indeed, it is because of the demands of the citizenry inside the Empire, whether made knowingly or not, by its sheer spending capacity, demand for goods, needs and wants, along with its refusal to institute change that America embarks on the destruction of lands and the near enslavement of peoples. Inside Empire her entrails must be fed and appeased to the engorgement of their lifestyles, less the hunger pains of having to live like the rest of the planet creep into existence, popping the infallible bubble shielded by predatory capitalism and debauched democracy.
The slaughter has not stopped, it has simply evolved, from smallpox-infected blankets, Fire Water and banishment into hellholes called reservations to the wholesale mass murder in the Philippines to the introduction of crack cocaine into America's urban jungles to the devastation of economic genocide called sanctions to the virtual enslavement of land and peoples called market colonialism that has resulted in vast poverty and lost opportunity to the chemical WMD called Agent Orange in Vietnam that has killed hundreds of thousands and riddled with disease countless more to the herbicide warfare in Columbia to today's dirty bombs in Iraq, Afghanistan and Lebanon called depleted uranium, with cluster bombs, missiles and artillery raining down on innocent populations who will have to live generations with cancers, disease, death and deformities, the American appetite for violence is and has remained unrelenting, a natural product of her imperial and Empire aspirations, along with the love of materialism by her population that has, with the passage of time, only continued to grow.
Unwilling to alter a standard of living that has reached unsustainable proportions, with its population expanding instead of curtailing its outrageous demands for ever-increasing standards of living, its greed of material wealth and love of consumerism outstripping all semblance of control, the population inside the Empire are complicit in the crimes furthered by America. In its locust-like appetite for materialism and consumerism the citizenry of the Empire has condemned billions of their fellow human beings to a life in utter indigence, their abilities and talents used not for the betterment of themselves or their families, but for the greed of the plague hemorrhaging the planet towards its ultimate limit.
Untold millions remain at the margins of society, sacrificing opportunity and happiness, having to live inside polluted lands, under corrupted governments and under extreme duress, all so that the chosen few in America can continue living in privilege, comfort and security, without the concerns and stresses of billions, without knowing what suffering is like, without seeing that reality for billions is a life harsh, brutal and oftentimes full of tragedy, where life is lived one day at a time, meal to meal, surviving living in shacks, drinking foul water, hoping to escape the fate of disease, forced to allow capitalism to exploit your full life, slowly, yet surely, eviscerating the energy inside you that makes you human.
For the prosperity of 300 million people five billion must be sacrificed, their lands pillaged, resources stolen, their nations made subservient vassal states squeezed of their energy, their soils despoiled, air poisoned, water made toxic. Billions of human beings make two dollars or less a day, with billions making a dollar more, all living on fumes, finding food from the garbage heaps of society, forced to become the automatons churning America's unending addiction to materialistic goods, transforming thinking flesh into robotic automation, becoming the slaves of the Empire, of the Pax Americana, the only nation blessed by the Christian god.
Every Empire has its domestic slaves, as well as its foreign ones, a servant class of people engineered by society to do America's dirty, dehumanizing and hard labor, the kind of work hidden from view, tucked away in the armpit of the state's cesspool, jobs Empire's citizens no longer care to perform. It is the labor of sweat, of blood and of tears, of unhinged and exerted energy that punishes the body and drains the mind and that has produced in the citizenry such aversion to its toil as to grant it exclusive reservation to the slave class.
America is no exception, and inside its bowels, where once those of African origin boiled under the midday sun or inside the scorching factory, to be whipped or raped or lynched, where once the Irish and the Italians and the Germans and the Polish suffered severed limbs or broken backs and worn out bodies, today imported from Mexico and other "southern" nations a new generation of Empire's slaves can be seen, picking up where the slaves of old left off, fighting xenophobia, injustice, inequality, discrimination and prejudice at work and at play, their dark skin and indigenous faces making them aliens and criminals in a foreign land, the new scapegoat to the native population, the new untouchable caste whose work and toil add comfort and relaxation to the citizenry, their only crimes the pursuit of a better life, the pursuit of happiness and the chance to be human, an opportunity to escape the market colonialism masked in neo-liberal colors and NAFTA language as well as the corrosive omnipresence of the Empire that devastates all southern peoples not living inside its borders.
Wherever one cares not to look is where this new slave works, hidden behind the periphery, squeaking out a clandestine life, becoming a shadow of a human being, marginalized and blamed by the ignorant and fearful for the Empire's ills, doing all the work the gluttonous citizenry has become too arrogant and lazy to perform, laboring so that the populace can retain their ravenous standard of living. Indeed, they have been allowed to enter the domain of the Empire undocumented with a wink and a nod, for the Establishment, as well as the intelligentsia and the corporate world, know that they are vitally important to the short and long term economic vitality and increased standard of living of America and its people, injecting new life and energy, as well as new ideas, into the Empire, regardless of what the ignorant, uneducated and fearful masses may think and notwithstanding the political spin so-called lawmakers give.
Over the last several decades it has been the Empire's society itself, those hundreds of millions residing inside the only land blessed by the Christian god, that has raised the specter of worry among many who think that America has begun its eventual decline and fall. It is the Empire's hubris and mentality of ignorance among its people, along with its materialist and consumerist addictions, bred from birth and through nurtured brainwashing, that has indeed launched the Pax Americana's decline into orbit. Today's citizenry has become lazy and complacent, with the absolute hypnotizing trance of television helping to morph normal human bodies into the obese creatures of gluttony. Television monitors have become the sun Americans revolve around, inside their little solar system the small moons of remote controls hover close by, with meteorites called crumbs landing and dotting the surface of the torso, the family couch becoming the Jupiter to our Uranus, the glow of our all powerful sun feeling warm and cozy and hypnotic to our brain dead thoughts.
The population has fused itself with the always-expanding vehicle, one becoming part of the other, with humans dependent on the driving and power of the car to transport them even to the nearest store, one block away. No longer walking or exercising, only doing snack and junk food aerobics with the wrist and fingers, Americans and their waistlines have exploded outwards, showcasing symptoms of the diseases of greed and gluttony, much of it the result of both laziness and the chemically-laced, hormone-full, preservative-saturated, sugar-coated garbage we call food.
The American people pray to the television monitor, the Almighty Dollar becoming the new god, the grand cathedrals of commerce called malls becoming the new sacred ground from which capitalism and human can be brought closer together, joined in a heavenly satisfaction of inner turmoil by the purchase of material goods. It is capitalism, and the mirage of comfort it spawns, that has made the Empire's populace complacent, obedient, comfortable and unwilling to question authority. These are but the crumbs and bones and scraps capitalism's masters give the masses to remain silent and acquiescent.
The Empire declares itself the land of the free, yet its population works the most of any developed nation, almost becoming automatons in need of no rest or relaxation. It becomes sacrilegious to take time off work and cherish one's family; it is heresy to take time off in order to take care of personal duties. Americans either become addicts to work and slaves to their bosses or one becomes an unwanted pariah. The pressure to conform and remain complacent while the system shackles one's life is omnipotent; its effects on stress and life become extreme burdens on one's psychology. Every year hails the arrival of more police powers, more autocratic rule, less democracy and civil rights and liberties. Every year sees the government of, by and for the People transformed into one of, by and for the Corporate World.
The Empire leads the world in psychotropic, sedative and anti-depressant drug prescriptions, as if its populace is suffering extreme forms of mental disorders, with stress and depression rampant, unhappiness continuing to rise and the overall feeling of well-being eroding with the passing of the seasons. People are overworked, underpaid, struggling to make ends meet, even with two jobs, fearful and made insecure by the same government created to protect and defend them. Television has become teacher, parent, babysitter, best friend and role model for children whose brain waves are being rewired thanks to the rapid imagery and fast sound bites seen on the monitor, their behaviors being conditioned to suit the interests of the corporate world, in time becoming one more serf to the corporate master. Reality cannot offer perfection and so Americans seek the fictions of television, becoming glued to the shows that offer the greatest beauty, the best fantasy, the happiest ending, the joyful perfection that humanity always seeks yet can never achieve.
Every year that passes the decimation of education by government can be seen and felt, with students falling behind world leaders in the sciences, liberal arts, mathematics and in reading. Americans no longer have knowledge of the world outside their immediate bubbles, understanding little about other cultures and even less about history. University tuition and costs have seemingly continued to rise on a per year basis thus having the effect, along with the slashing of funds for both student loans and financial aid, of making college unattainable to millions of otherwise qualified individuals. Elementary and secondary schools now teach to standardized tests, besides having funds slashed across the board, creating entire generation of robots and automatons, thereby helping to erode free thought, reasoning skills, logic and critical thinking, in essence preparing children for a life as unthinking drones, engineered for obedience and blind loyalty, not one full of knowledge and free thought. This might be, in fact, exactly what leaders have had in mind all along, for an uneducated mind is easier to control and manipulate than a thinking, knowledgeable one.
In the most powerful and wealthiest nation on Earth, one that considers itself an Empire, superior to and above all other states on the planet, pregnant with a myriad number of colleges and universities, it is incomprehensible that inside its borders exists a level of fundamentalist religion that beckons the days of the Dark Ages, a time when humanity turned backwards in time, doing its best to declare open warfare against science, reason and logic. Where one would expect renaissance and enlightenment, because of education levels, wealth indicators and standards of living, instead one finds open hostility to knowledge and an uncompromising love for ignorance. Where one would expect secular thinking and scientific reasoning instead one finds religious conviction and archaic, primitive thought.
Indeed, the religious fanaticism prevalent among large segments of society is a symptom of the disease called under education, of the state purposefully creating millions of ignorant, unthinking citizens, the easier to control and dominate them. For if they can be brainwashed from youth to place blind faith and loyalty in an entity never seen or heard, thinking this hollow fantasy an Anglo-Saxon white man with a white beard hovering in the sky above, then how easy can it be to condition them to place blind faith and loyalty in a tangible, visible government creation that is manufactured to be the only human entity capable of protecting and securing their person and family?
Where one would expect common sense to prevail, such as in the use of contraception and in the reality of evolution and global warming, instead one finds the idiocy of abstinence, of creationism/intelligent design and of the Rapture, all based on the thousands-years-old, primitive, archaic and fantasy-laced fables and myths. Only in America, among developed nations, can scientific fact be challenged by theological ideology, making science fit the religious beliefs of the nation. Only in America can the obviousness of evolution be ignored and discarded, to be denied its teaching in a 21st century classroom. In America, pro-life means saving pin-size zygotes, but not the life of the diseased or of the suffering through stem-cell research. Pro-life would rather have a woman and child suffer in indigence and lost opportunity for life rather than giving the woman a chance at a better life down the road. It would call the destruction of microscopic cells murder but stay silent on the mass killing by America of over 250,000 innocent Iraqis.
It is in this religious zealotry that one can see the xenophobia, indeed the boiling hatred, that millions of Americans possess for the Empire's new enemy, the dreaded Arab. Combined with the rabid patriotism, blind loyalty and love of the red, white and blue - betraying the high level of testosterone inherent in America's tribal fascination - evangelical belief loves to hate dark-skinned enemies, bomb innocent heathens and wage war on the descendents of the New Testament people which, naturally, like Jesus himself, are Arab. Unlike Jesus, however, whom they hold in very high regard, they have no qualms unleashing state sponsored terror on the innocent, on children, babies, grandparents and women. Such is the culture of life.
In this frenzy of manufactured and conditioned hate we see the engine moving the pistons and spark plugs of America's Middle East disasters, with blind loyalty to flag and cross, confident that the infidels will be brought under the boots of the great American military. In the mammoth churches of the evangelical cults can we see the grease lubricating the American military-industrial complex, granting it the green light needed to eradicate the lands of ancient Mesopotamia, where the Euphrates and the Tigris meet, where Babylon once stood, where civilization itself first breathed life. The fear and bigotry against those they do not know or understand, against those they are told are the enemy, are a corrosive and dangerous belief structure, one based on ignorance and blind faith. Millions of ethnic minorities throughout history have been exterminated for less hatred engendered.
War as the Health of the State
With the rise of the Industrial Revolution giving her the strong winds needed to maintain Empire's momentum, America soon found herself growing exponentially, rivaling European powers, yet confidently knowing that her endowed resources, both natural and human, combined with her rivals' lack thereof, would eventually allow her to supplant those she desired to become. All that was needed was time and perhaps even a little luck. Coincidentally, it would be the unlucky disasters of World Wars I and II, both of which devastated America's European rivals, that would grant America the ascendancy, as well as the opportunity, she had been waiting for. It would be through war that the health of the state would be assured.
After the end of the Second World War, with her rivals decimated and in desperate need of both reconstruction and peace, America became the world Empire her masters had always envisioned. Not only would America rebuild Europe's and Japan's battered infrastructures and economies, not to mention Western Europe's militaries, resulting in an immense shift in the balance of world power, she would also go on to usurp Europe's colonies in the Middle East, with their vast petroleum fields, as well as those of Asia and Africa whose natural resources the western world coveted.
With Latin America already firmly in her tight grip, America would, thanks to the manipulations and fears of the Cold War, extend her imperial hegemony throughout the globe, using her military to overtly control the world's natural resources, her growing intelligence services to covertly dominate the nations of the planet, her wealth and power to support and maintain puppet regimes, her corporations to supply the world with American goods and military equipment, and her political strength to dominate world affairs. The Pax Americana had, thanks to the wickedness that is human war, become the dominant nation in the free world, becoming, again, thanks to human destruction and violence, the new Empire, an entity whose dominance would not and has yet to be challenged.
World War II, with its eventual carnage and suffering, its devastated peoples and ruined cities, with the tens of millions of dead human beings, nonetheless was the catalyst that propelled the American Empire to new heights, leaving its motherland untouched and unharmed, allowing it to spread its military to all corners of the globe, creating a plethora of golden opportunities it would take full advantage of. Following years of depression that only entry into the war could alleviate, America was transformed from rising star to full-fledged Empire. If war was the health of the state, World War II was the wonder drug - the penicillin - that inoculated America from malady and gave it superpower status.
Like all Empires, America began her quest for hegemony through warfare, a tool that would suit her needs quite well in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, though like a powerful narcotic would soon become an addiction she would not be able to exorcise from her psyche. From the inception of her creation war, and her ability to wage it, has been of paramount importance, both for the well being of the economy and to the mythology of her greatness. It has been war, along with her success, or failure, on the battlefield, that has defined both America's history and her people's belief in her omnipotence.
Indeed, the use of war has created the national character just as much as the national character has created war. America's over 100 military interventions throughout the world since the start of the twentieth century, to say nothing of the various adventures against it own indigenous population in the nineteenth century, has conditioned the citizenry to an almost perpetual state of warfare, passed on from generation to generation, that has served to create a war culture ready almost at a moment's notice to march lock step with the thunderous drums of war generated by the government and, most recently, by the military-energy-industrial complex.
War is as American as apple pie and baseball, a national pastime that serves to maintain the perpetual wartime economy so needed for a viable standard of living. It has been her many wars that have contributed to her unsurpassed wealth and power, for her military has at present established over 700 bases worldwide, most of them located in vital geostrategic lands full of important natural resources and interests. Firm control over the world's natural resources, especially petroleum, has assured America of cheap raw materials from which to exploit, basically pilfering them from third world nations, offering very little in return, only enriching the elite majority at the expense of the indigent masses, while helping to increase the giant, though excessively gluttonous, America empire. Much of her wealth has been and continues to be generated from the suffering of billions of humans who will never see the benefits of the treasure that lies below their feet, as well as the pillaging of resources, along with the rape of land, air and water, that do not rightfully belong to her.
America's addiction to war has created a war culture at ease with the idea of warfare as a means of securing for the nation and the citizenry a comfortable standard of living. In order to maintain the comfort and excesses afforded inside the Pax Americana, full of cheap gas, lumber, minerals, foodstuffs, goods, construction supplies and raw materials, the nations of the globe, especially those of the south, must supply America and her economy with the natural and human resources needed to quench the hunger emanating inside the belly of the beast. Using the allocation of power it maintains, along with its unequal bargaining power, America has established with the nations of the south very favorable trade terms so that it may continue pillaging the resources it needs to maintain its unsustainable development. It therefore supplies itself with great natural wealth at very low costs, exploiting and devastating the lands of the south so that its economy may continue expanding and so that its people may continue living in comfort and gluttony.
This is the reality of America, though today Empire, instead of stretching for a few thousand miles, encompasses all corners of the globe. Its reach is omnipresent; its grip omnipotent. From exploiting mineral wealth in Africa, timber in Asia, oil in the Middle East, fruit in Latin America and cheap labor throughout the southern nations of the globe, the Pax Americana has assured itself of the very best resources from all reaches of the planet, all at the lowest costs and prices. Since its corporations dominate world trade, since its political power is that of Empire, America determines policies as well as terms, assuring itself of free rape, pillage and destruction of lands, resources and peoples it wants to exploit.
With a myriad number of governments, dictators and so-called kings in firm, clenched American control, with reward given them if they obey the Empire's dictates, with punishment if they do not, the nations of the planet are but fiefdoms of the Empire, with proconsuls and chieftains and lord and masters guarding America's lands and resources, with its garrisons and centurions and legions protecting her interests. With the expansion of Empire also comes an expansion of its military, for citizens of the lands being exploited and pillaged need to be controlled and dominated, lest rebellions and revolutions and movements try to usurp power from America. The peoples whose lands and resources are needed by the Empire do not take kindly to having their lands destroyed, their resources stolen and their lives made barren, and must therefore be controlled and made subservient to the dictates of Old Glory. It is therefore imperative for the Empire to maintain order in the lands it controls, and must thus have garrisons and bases throughout the globe. Today, these number over 700 worldwide, the product of protection of resources, assets, interests and geostrategic locations, of establishing a presence, of intimidating potential rivals, of squashing any form of challenge to the Empire. This is the reality of today's Empire; a modern day version Rome on steroids and human growth hormone, needing war, tyrannical vassals and all forms of unscrupulous accords to maintain power and control.
Lesson Learned or History Repeated?
It is within America's borders that the erosion of her power and wealth can be studied, where the rampant decadence can be traced, where her lost values can be seen and where her afflictions can be analyzed. It is inside her where the human condition can be analyzed and where we can see, quite possibly, the direction where America and humanity are headed in. For over one hundred years she has been the Rome of the modern world, unrivaled in power and reach, for years the leader in introducing new technologies and medicines, her higher education once highly sought by the world's university students, her cities expanding vertically as well as horizontally, their wealth apparent with the construction of giant skyscrapers, giving rise to a new paradigm in human ingenuity, creating steel and glass canyons populated by millions of human beings, her population rising from an amalgam of the world, her principles becoming a shining beacon upon civilization, a land like no other, at one time full of opportunity, sought after by millions of individual people from all over the world, her pursuit of equality, freedom and democracy spawning innumerable admirers throughout the planet. Her principles and culture have reached every corner of the globe, her wealth and influence have touched every single human being; like Rome before, she will undeniably leave a legacy wherever her hands have touched.
Yet the corruption of her society, its love for the Almighty dollar, the debasement of her principles, and the outward decay of her foundations can all be seen in the darkness that is her present existence, like a full moon finally giving light to dark surroundings. She is Empire, not unique and not new, not the first and not the last one; her methods are those used by all powers that have come before, regardless of size or power, of wealth or location. Empire is humanity just as much as humanity is Empire. It is our greatest desires giving rise to the best in humanity, only to have our deadliest vices entangle us in a web of corruption and debasement. Empire is war and conquest and destruction and suffering, regardless of time or of power, showing us, more than anything, that it is humanity that must change Empire, not the other way around. Only then can Empire as we know it be crushed, its violence and exploitation and corruption of human behavior finally suppressed and put to rest.
Yet for some reason the human condition demands that Empires rise and dominate, just like they have from the very beginning of our long journey on Earth. We as a species can never seem to escape this reality, just like we oftentimes fail to dominate our primate urges and behaviors. We must understand our origins in order to understand our psychology and our actions and maybe then, after careful examination and upon further introspection of ourselves, looking not into a foggy mirror but into a lucid image of who and what we really are, will we be able to exorcise our innermost demons, shedding our violent skin aside, understanding our mammalian origins, and hence our behaviors, and forever putting a stop to the human malady of warfare that always seems to resurrect itself from our psyche at the touch of our passions, emotions, behaviors or instincts. Perhaps we will one day learn to control the wickedness that for too long we have unleashed upon our fellow human beings. It is in Empire's cycle that humanity's truth can be seen. It is in its actions that our behaviors can be studied and analyzed. In Empires past, present and future we see ourselves; in their history can we see our future.
Like all Empires before and all that are surely yet to come, America has reached her apex and downward is she now headed. One day soon the torch will be passed on to a new generation of Empire, surely, like her predecessors before her, following the cycle of hegemony, rising, maturing and eventually falling, growing pure, reaching the pinnacle of power, declining, debased and corrupt just like her predecessors, her citizens growing self-aggrandized, gluttonous, ignorant and arrogant, their delusion of grandeur and superiority unleashing suffering and violence upon the world. Perhaps, however, tomorrow's power will learn from the present's errors, absorbing the lessons inherent in the rise and fall of the Pax Americana, understanding that our human nature is as powerful as our greatest technologies, if not more so. Perhaps humanity will learn as well, preferring to live in unison rather than die divided.
For Empire today is global, no longer is it the regional power of yesteryear. As a result, the playing field has shrunk, the powerful competitors are closer and the chances for conflict have intensified. With dwindling resources, especially those of water and oil, with a booming human population, with the existence of nuclear weaponry, with global warming soon to unleash its dastardly consequences upon our fragile civilization, with human nature being what it is and with the primitive love of tribe and theology embedded in our psychology, the danger of self-extermination has grown exponentially, threatening to destroy all life on the planet.
With a future based on more conflict, not less, with old Empires and new rivals ready to wage battle over territory and resources and power and control, there now emerges a vitally important decision to be made: do we continue our ways, which based on technology and human nature means certain extermination, or do we find common ground, understand who and what we are and deviate away from a path that continues to bring us closer to the brink of self-destruction? Unfortunately, momentum is with the latter, just as it has always been. Dare we change it, and the course of human destiny as well?
Something much greater than humankind's primitive fascination with the tribe or Empire must surely exist, waiting to be incorporated into human civilization, waiting to shed its enlightenment upon all of humanity.
Original
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Editor's Note: The article in question has since been translated into English here
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| Led by unidentified relatives, Lebanese girl Lara Abdallah, 6, cries as she walks in the funeral procession Thursday, Aug. 24, 2006 for her mother, sister and four brothers killed July 15 by Israeli forces bombardment on their car convoy as they were trying to flee the southern border village of Marwaheen, Lebanon. Lara is one of four people who survived the attack. Twenty-three people were killed in total. (thank you Israel). |
It would seem British intelligence services, in collusion with the cops and Scotland Yard, are getting better at finding palatable lunatics to represent Muslims in Britain, or maybe it is "Londonistan," although I'm sure more than a few Londoners recoil at this characterization.
One such lunatic is Abu Abdullah, an associate of Abu Hamza, a perfect choice due to his psychopathic personality disorder, in full bloom in a video on the Hot Air blog.
Due to the fact he is a misanthropic piece of work, Abu Abdullah, a former youth football coach, praises to the sky both the London 7/7 bombings and the alleged and entirely ludicrous liquid bomb plot, the former an obvious false flag operation, complete with complimentary terror drills, and the latter an impossibility on an airliner, minus a pile of chemistry lab tools.
Even though Abdullah has been kicked out of every mosque in Britain, because he is obviously a psychopathic madman, he remained "unchecked by the authorities five months after a law was passed making it a criminal offense to glorify terrorism," according to the Times Online. Obviously, this is the case because Abu is a patsy-in-waiting, on hold for the next fake terrorist attack, or rather spoiled terrorist attack, that is to say made-up nonsense.
In the lead-up to the raid on the Jameah Islamiyah school at Mark Cross, Crowborough, Sussex, Abdullah was arrested "moments after leaving a Chinese restaurant in Borough. His brother Musa Ahmet is also reported to have been detained," reports the Daily Mail.
Now the British establishment, chomping at the bit to rationalize their recently imposed anti-terrorism laws, already coming under fire for "serious human rights abuses," according to Amnesty International, have their man, a prefect patsy, one who can be splashed all over the corporate media as a fine example of the sort of Muslim terrorist swarming over the United Kingdom, ready to unleash murder and mayhem.
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Aug 2006:
Bush says Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11.
Get this video to all men and women in the military!
More on what the troops think:
An overwhelming majority of 72% of American troops serving in Iraq think the U.S. should exit the country within the next year, and more than one in four say the troops should leave immediately, a new Le Moyne College/Zogby International survey shows....
While 85% said the U.S. mission is mainly "to retaliate for Saddam's role in the 9-11 attacks," 77% said they also believe the main or a major reason for the war was "to stop Saddam from protecting al Qaeda in Iraq." (Both False: Saddam had no ties to al-Qaeda, no role in 9/11)
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Afghan opium production soars to new high
POSTED: 2324 GMT (0724 HKT), September 2, 2006
KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- Afghanistan's world-leading opium cultivation rose a "staggering" 60 percent this year, the U.N. anti-drugs chief announced Saturday in urging the government to crack down on big traffickers and remove corrupt officials and police.
The record crop yielded 6,100 tons of opium, or enough to make 610 tons of heroin -- outstripping the demand of the world's heroin users by a third, according to U.N. figures.
Officials warned that the illicit trade is undermining the Afghan government, which is under attack by Islamic militants that a U.S.-led offensive helped drive from power in late 2001 for harboring Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda bases.
"The news is very bad. On the opium front today in some of the provinces of Afghanistan, we face a state of emergency," Antonio Maria Costa, chief of the U.N. Office on Drugs and Crime, said at a news conference. "In the southern provinces, the situation is out of control."
He talked with reporters after presenting results of the U.N. survey to Afghan President Hamid Karzai, who voiced "disappointment" over the figures. "Our efforts to fight narcotics have proved inadequate," Karzai said in a statement.
With the economy struggling, there are not enough jobs and many Afghans say they have to grow opium poppies to feed their families. The trade already accounts for at least 35 percent of Afghanistan's economy, financing warlords and insurgents.
The top U.S. narcotics official here said the opium trade is a threat to the country's fledgling democracy.
"This country could be taken down by this whole drugs problem," Doug Wankel told reporters. "We have seen what can come from Afghanistan, if you go back to 9/11. Obviously the U.S. does not want to see that again."
The bulk of the opium increase was in lawless Helmand province, where cultivation rose 162 percent and accounted for 42 percent of the Afghan crop. The province has been wracked by the surge in attacks by Taliban-led militants that has produced the worst fighting in five years.
Opium-growing increased despite the injection of hundreds of millions of dollars in foreign aid to fight the drug over the past two years. Costa criticized the international effort and said foreign aid was "plagued by huge overhead costs" in its administration.
Costa said Afghanistan's insecurity is fueling the opium boom, saying he has pleaded with the NATO force that took over military operations in the south a month ago to take a "stronger role" in fighting drugs. NATO says it has no mandate for direct involvement in the anti-drug campaign.
"We need much stronger, forceful measures to improve security or otherwise I'm afraid we are going to face a dramatic situation of failed regions, districts and even perhaps even provinces in the near future," Costa said.
The U.N. report, based on satellite imagery and ground surveys, said the area under poppy cultivation in Afghanistan reached 407,700 acres in 2006, up from 257,000 acres in 2005. The previous high was 323,700 acres in 2004.
The estimated yield of 6,100 tons of opium resin -- described by Costa as "staggering" -- is up from 4,100 tons last year, and exceeds the previous high for total global output of 5,764 tons recorded in 1999.
Last year, about 450 tons of heroin was consumed worldwide, 90 percent of it from Afghanistan, according to the U.N.
The report will increase pressure on the beleaguered Afghan president. Karzai has often talked tough on drugs, even declaring a "holy war" against the trade, but he is increasingly criticized for appointing and failing to sack corrupt provincial governors and police.
Costa urged the arrest of "serious drug traffickers" to fill a new high-security wing for narcotics convicts at Kabul's Policharki prison. "It has 100 beds. We want these beds to be taken up in the next few months," he said.
At the same news conference, the Afghan counternarcotics minister, Habibullah Qaderi, said the government had the will to make arrests, but lacked the capacity to gather evidence to prosecute "the big fish."
Yet he maintained that with its newly unveiled national anti-drugs strategy, Afghanistan could "control" drug production within five years.
Costa was less upbeat. "It's going to take possibly 20 years to get rid of the problem," he said, citing the experience of former opium producers like Thailand, Turkey and Pakistan.
In an indication of the alarming extent of official complicity in the trade, a Western counternarcotics official said about 25,000 to 30,000 acres of government land in Helmand was used to cultivate opium poppies this year.
The official, who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said police and government officials are involved in cultivating poppies, providing protection for growers or taking bribes to ensure the crops aren't destroyed.
He said the Taliban -- which managed to nearly eradicate Afghanistan's poppy crop in 2001, just before their ouster for giving refuge to Osama bin Laden -- now profit from the trade.
In some instances, drug traffickers have provided vehicles and money to the Taliban to carry out terrorist attacks, he said. But he added that the ties seem to be local and that there is no evidence of coordination between drug lords and the Taliban leadership.
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Life in Amerika
Democratic lawmakers want DOD changes
AP
Mon Sep 4, 2006
WASHINGTON - Leading Democratic lawmakers on Monday urged
President Bush to consider changing the civilian leadership at the Pentagon, one week after Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld warned against fascism and appeasement as he defended U.S. policies in Iraq.
Rumsfeld drew heavy criticism from Democrats after telling an American Legion convention in Salt Lake City that "it is apparent that many have still not learned history's lessons." In alluding to criticism aimed at Bush administration war policies, he used terms associated with the failure to stop Nazism in the 1930s.
The political parties renewed debate over Iraq and Rumsfeld's tenure at the Defense Department as the traditional fall campaign season began on Labor Day.
In a letter released Monday, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi of California and Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and 10 other congressional party leaders told the president that considering making such a change would show he recognizes the problems his policies "have created in Iraq and elsewhere."
"While a change in your Iraq policy will best advance our chances for success, we do not believe the current civilian leadership at the Department of Defense is suited to implement and oversee such a change in policy," the lawmakers wrote.
The 850-word letter criticizes Bush's policies in Iraq, calling them part of a "stay the course strategy" that has failed to make the U.S. more secure, and it suggests several changes long called for by Democratic leaders.
Others who signed the letter were Sens. Dick Durbin of Illinois, Carl Levin of Michigan, Joe Biden of Delaware, Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia and Daniel Inouye of Hawaii; and Reps. Steny Hoyer of Maryland, Ike Skelton of Missouri, Tom Lantos and Jane Harman of California, and John Murtha of Pennsylvania.
In response to the Democrats' letter, Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., issued a statement accusing Democrats, including national chairman Howard Dean, of calling for retreat from Iraq before the U.S. mission there was completed. U.S.-led forces invaded Iraq in March 2003 and removed dictator Saddam Hussein from power.
"The Democrat leadership finally agrees on something - unfortunately it's retreat. Whether they call it 'redeployment' or 'phased withdrawal,' the effect is the same: We would leave Americans more vulnerable and Iraqis at the mercy of al-Qaida, a terrorist group whose aim - toward Iraqis and Americans - is clear," said McConnell, the Republican whip in the Senate.
Comment: Does anyone really believe that the Democrats - who did nothing to stop the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq and who, in fact, fully supported Bush and the Republicans for the most part - have actually changed their stripes?? The Democrats, like the Republicans, will tell the public anything if it will get them elected.
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G.O.P. Sets Aside Work on Immigration
By CARL HULSE and RACHEL L. SWARNS
The New York Times
September 5, 2006
WASHINGTON - As they prepare for a critical pre-election legislative stretch, Congressional Republican leaders have all but abandoned a broad overhaul of immigration laws and instead will concentrate on national security issues they believe play to their political strength.
With Congress reconvening Tuesday after an August break, Republicans in the House and Senate say they will focus on Pentagon and domestic security spending bills, port security legislation and measures that would authorize the administration's terror surveillance program and create military tribunals to try terror suspects.
"We Republicans believe that we have no choice in the war against terror and the only way to do it is to continue to take them head-on whether it is in Iraq or elsewhere," said Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio, the majority leader.
A final decision on what do about immigration policy awaits a meeting this week of senior Republicans. But key lawmakers and aides who set the Congressional agenda say they now believe it would be politically risky to try to advance an immigration measure that would showcase party divisions and need to be completed in the 19 days Congress is scheduled to meet before breaking for the election.
President Bush had made comprehensive changes in immigration laws a priority, even making the issue the subject of a prime-time address, but House Republicans have been determined not to move ahead with any legislation that could be construed as amnesty for anyone who entered the country illegally. They held hearings around the country in recent weeks to contrast their enforcement-only bill with a Senate measure that could lead to citizenship for some.
"I don't see how you bridge that divide between us and the Senate," said Representative Peter T. King, Republican of New York and chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. "I don't see it happening. I really don't."
Democrats say they are not surprised by the immigration impasse and believe some Republicans would prefer to keep the issue alive to stir conservative voters rather than reach a legislative solution.
They plan to highlight the collapse of immigration legislation sought by Mr. Bush and the likelihood that Congress will not meet an Oct. 1 deadline to pass most required spending bills as evidence that Republicans have lost sight of the concerns of average Americans. The Democrats are also intensifying calls for the dismissal of Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld.
"Every day, people around the country recognize that this is a failed administration," said Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the Democratic leader. "If Republicans want to spend the whole month on nothing that is relevant to the American people, we are happy to do that."
With Democrats poised to pick up seats in the House and Senate and Republicans determined to hang on to their majorities for the final two years of the Bush administration, the next few weeks promise to be highly combative, particularly after the August primaries made it clear that voters are not in a forgiving mood.
In a draft of a planning memorandum to be circulated to Republican senators, Senator Bill Frist of Tennessee, who is entering his last months as majority leader, said, "I expect minority obstructionism to be at an all-time high." Republicans are already preparing for a post-election session to begin Nov. 13 and run at least up to Thanksgiving.
Mr. Frist laid out an ambitious agenda, including a vote on John Bolton's renomination to be ambassador to the United Nations. But his memorandum did not even mention immigration. In an appearance in Iowa last week, Mr. Frist said broad legislation addressing what to do about millions of illegal immigrants already in the United States might have to await the next Congress.
Staff members from the Senate and House Judiciary Committees met last week to try to find some basis for common ground on the fate of the illegal population, but one participant said they made no progress.
Representative Mike Pence, the leader of the House conservative caucus and a proponent of an immigration compromise proposal that has attracted some White House interest, said he was also doubtful that legislation would reach Mr. Bush's desk before the elections.
"Anything's possible," said Mr. Pence, Republican of Indiana, "but that's probably not likely."
Lawmakers of both parties who helped shape the Senate measure insisted that consensus was still within reach, even on the more difficult immigration issues, and immigrant advocacy groups are planning a series of marches this week to prod lawmakers to take action. Some Republicans warned that their party could suffer politically if it falls short.
"If there's not legislation with Republicans in charge," said Senator Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, "there's going to be blame here, and justifiable blame, if we do not produce a bill."
Two other senators who played a leading role in writing the Senate bill, John McCain, Republican of Arizona, and Edward M. Kennedy, Democrat of Massachusetts, intend to urge Mr. Bush to bring lawmakers to the White House to broker a resolution.
"We can get the job done, but it's going to require presidential leadership," Mr. Kennedy said.
With the immigration measure seemingly stalled, Republicans say they will put most of their time and energy into security-oriented measures to drive home a theme that has served them well in the last two elections - that they are better equipped to thwart terrorism than are Democrats.
"They'll wave the white flag in the war on terror," Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, said Sunday of the Democrats on the CBS News program "Face the Nation."
But Democrats believe that voters will not be easily persuaded by the Republican push on national security and that the public increasingly sees the Iraq war as an impediment to the war on terror.
In a letter to Mr. Bush on Monday, the Democratic leaders of the House and Senate urged him to begin pulling American troops out of Iraq this year.
"Mr. President, staying the course in Iraq has not worked and continues to divert resources and attention from the war on terrorism that should be the nation's top security priority," said the letter signed by Mr. Reid and Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the Democratic leader, as well as the senior Democrats on relevant committees.
The Democrats also urged Mr. Bush to fire Mr. Rumsfeld, and they intend to try to force no-confidence votes in coming days that could put Republicans on the spot, given statements by some in the party that Mr. Rumsfeld should resign. But the leadership remains supportive.
"I doubt there is any other American who could have done a better job over the last five years," Mr. Boehner said of the defense secretary.
Since they will not finish the spending bills on time, Republican leaders will have to push through a stopgap measure to keep the government running through the election. But Republicans do hope to advance some nonsecurity measures. The major legislation on the floor in the House this week is a bill that would ban trading in horses to be slaughtered for human consumption.
Comment: Neither Republicans nor Democrats actually care about immigration. They only care about getting elected. History has repeatedly shown that campaign slogans and promises don't amount to a hill of beans once a candidate gets into office.
In any case, Bush and his gang pushed the "evil immigrants" angle in order to get Americans fighting amongst themselves so that they are too distracted to concentrate on and work together against the administration. Even if the Bush gang never again raises the immigrant "issue", the damage has already been done.
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Immigration activists spar at Phoenix rally
By Tim Gaynor
Reuters
Sep 4, 2006
PHOENIX - Supporters and opponents of liberalized immigration laws bellowed at each other through bullhorns at a rally in Phoenix on Monday as pressure on the U.S. Congress to break a deadlock over a proposed immigration overhaul gathered pace nationwide.
About a thousand supporters of a Senate bill offering millions of illegal immigrants a path to citizenship gathered outside the Capitol building in downtown Phoenix on Labor Day, chanting, "We are America" and waving U.S. flags.
They were met by scores of angry opponents of the measure, toting placards urging authorities to "stop the criminal alien invasion" and "secure the border," who jabbed fingers at protesters and tried to shout down keynote speakers.
"These people are illegal aliens. They need to be incarcerated, fined and sent home," said activist Carol Hands, as she stood amid protesters shouting through bullhorns. Capitol police officers watched the groups in bright morning sunshine. There was no violence, and no arrests.
Plans to overhaul U.S. immigration laws have proven highly contentious, with opponents and supporters of a resolution favorable to immigrants divided both on the streets and in Congress.
The Senate approved a measure calling for tighter border security and a shot at citizenship for many of the estimated 11-12 million illegal immigrants that was backed by President George W. Bush, while a measure in the House of Representatives focused on narrowly on border security.
"We love this country, and we want a better deal," said Mexican construction worker Jose Avardo, 30, as he attended the protest with his wife and two children. "We want Bush to see us and bring us in from the shadows," he added.
CARDINAL URGES END TO DEADLOCK
The rally in Phoenix was one of several over the Labor Day weekend as pressure mounted on Congress to break the impasse when members return from recess on Tuesday ahead of Congressional mid-term elections in November.
Speaking at a Labor Day Catholic Mass at Los Angeles Cathedral, Cardinal Roger Mahony criticized lawmakers in Washington for dragging their heels over reforms.
"I say to members of Congress, you do not have the right or the luxury to let four weeks go by and refuse to deal with immigration reform," Mahony said.
Mahony, who has emerged as one of the leading advocates for illegal immigrants in the United States, said he sent letters on Monday to Bush and congressional leaders urging them to break the impasse.
In Illinois, meanwhile, around 3,000 activists gathered at the offices in Batavia of House speaker Dennis Hastert, a Republican, and laid crosses to commemorate illegal immigrants who have died crossing the border from Mexico.
The current round of protests kicked off with a march in Chicago on Friday. So far, its numbers have fallen well short of those seen in the first round on May 1, when protesters filled the streets of cities from California to New England.
It culminates on Thursday with a march through Washington that organizers hope will attract a million participants from across the eastern United States.
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US drivers hop on scooters to dodge rising gas prices
AFP
Sep 04, 2006
With rising gas prices an increasing number of US drivers have hopped on scooters, long a favorite in parts of the world familiar with pricey gasoline.
Karl Levithan, retired at 55, tools around the Washington suburbs on his silver Vespa from April to November while the weather is agreeable.
"Sometimes, less is more," he said, noting that fuel is often more than three dollars per gallon (3.8 liter) now. "Americans should think about more efficient means of transportation."
Scooters get a whopping 60 to 80 miles (97 to 129 kilometers) per gallon of gas compared to fuel hungry cars which average 20 miles (32 kilometers).
This year is set to mark a record in scooter sales although the streets are far from resembling traffic in Milan.
"The big markets are urban markets, vacation destinations and college towns," said Mike Mount, spokesman for the Motorcycle Industry Council.
According to the industry group, 113,000 scooters were sold in 2005, up 18 percent from the year before.
The market is led by Japanese makers Honda and Yamaha, but storied Italian brand Vespa from Piaggio, which was pulled from the market in 1985 because of pollution problems, made a big splash went it was reintroduced in 2000 with retro looking models.
The maker has 180 stores around the country with the most sales in the cities of New York, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle on the Pacific coast, and Dallas, Texas, according to Piaggio Americas spokeswoman Kathleen Reynolds.
Randy Campbell opened a shop in Dallas three years ago and will open a second in a few weeks in near-by Fort Worth, Texas.
"The more you see them riding the more they are gaining popularity," he said. He said his clients are mostly between the ages of 35 and 55 and that 40 percent or more are women. Half are buying the scooters, which sell for between 3,000 and 4,000 dollars, for pleasure, a quarter for economy and "some for the hip-cool."
Suburban rider Levithan agreed that the look helped.
"The more retro it is, the better it is," he said. He added that scooters are "more socially accepted" than motorcycles. "People smile at it."
The service manager at Campbell's university-town store, Rian Sumner, also noted that riders skew older.
"More professors are riding them than students who get big cars with air conditioning," he said.
But in Washington, where gasoline is more expensive than in Texas, prices are driving scooters' popularity, according to Gerry Helfgott, an Italian who opened a Vespa store in the nation's capital.
However, two wheels cannot replace four and Campbell said few of his customers use scooters as their only mode of transport.
But, he said, "a few customers replace their second car with a scooter."
The northwest city of Boise, Idaho, has only 200,000 residents but Valery Aker sells about 20 scooters per month at her two-year-old shop.
"The more people see them, the more they like the idea," she said. "And they are fun."
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Fingerprint compression to speed up search for criminals
Reuters
September 4, 2006
Catching criminals could become quicker thanks to a new fingerprint technique developed by British scientists.
Researchers at the University of Sheffield in England have developed a technique to compress fingerprints lifted from a crime scene so they can be transmitted to a fingerprint bureau in a fraction of the normal four to 20 minutes.
"Now we can transmit a lift within 30 to 60 seconds," professor Nigel Alinson told a news conference on Monday at the British Association Festival of Science.
The system, which will be used by all 43 U.K. police forces, was approved by the National Fingerprint Board earlier this year.
Instead of visiting several crime scenes and waiting until the end of the day to get the prints to a bureau, crime scene examiners can use a laptop with a wireless card and a small scanner to send them via mobile phone networks.
In an area of England where the system was tested it takes, on average, four days to get an identity. The system could reduce that to less than two hours, Alinson said.
"The current record time for an examiner attending a scene to a suspect's identity being obtained is 20 minutes," he said.
Alinson and his colleagues are also working on developing technology to identify footwear impressions and shoe patterns taken from crime scenes.
Although footwear evidence is not as unique as DNA or fingerprints, Alinson said there is more chance of picking up footprints from the scene than fingerprints.
Since January, new police powers in England allow footwear impressions to be taken from crime scenes and stored and searched in a database.
"There is no practical technology to do this at the moment--it is done manually," Alinson said.
The software he and his team are working on will compare features of the shoe with a reference library of up to 12,000 different models.
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Book: Bush told reporter Jews are 'all going to hell'
Raw Story
02/09/2006
An upcoming book about presidential advisor Karl Rove reports allegations of anti-semitism by President George W. Bush, RAW STORY has learned.
In The Architect: Karl Rove and the Master Plan for Absolute Power, Austin-based journalist James Moore and Wayne Slater, senior political reporter for the Dallas Morning News, will allege that Bush once made anti-semitic comments to a reporter.
"You know what I'm gonna tell those Jews when I get to Israel, don't you Herman?" a then Governor George W. Bush allegedly asked a reporter for the Austin American-Statesman.
When the journalist, Ken Herman, replied that he did not know, Bush reportedly delivered the punch line: "I'm telling 'em they're all going to hell
Bush's thoughts on the fate of non-Christian souls became a minor source of controversy after he told the Houston Post in 1993 that only those who "accept Jesus Christ" go to Heaven. However, the future president was also earlier briefly engaged to a half-Jewish woman.
The quip never received wider media attention, even though the Austin American-Statesman reported it in December of 1998.
"As he gazed out a hotel hallway at the Superdome and waited for an elevator, Bush -- clearly going for a laugh at his own expense -- said the first thing he was going to say to Israeli Jews was that they were all 'going to hell,'" Herman had reported. "Bush, who has both a quick wit and generally good judgment on when to use it, made the comment to the same Austin American-Statesman reporter who had reported his 1993 comments about his religious beliefs."
The authors of The Architect assert that religion and ethnicity have been manipulated by Bush and Rove to "divide" and "conquer" the nation. RAW STORY obtained a copy of The Architect late this week.
More information about the book, to be released Tuesday, can be found here.
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Justice in America: Jail Time For Taking Rotten Fruit and Vegetables
Steamboat Pilot and Today
05/09/2006
One of the owners of a fresh produce store said Saturday that it is absurd that two men are in jail for taking spoiled fruit and vegetables from the store's trash area.
On Wednesday, Giles Charlé, 24, of Somersworth, N.H., and David Siller, 27, of Wayne, Pa., pleaded guilty to misdemeanor trespass and were sentenced to spend six months in Routt County Jail and pay $15 in restitution to Sweet Pea Produce. The men were on their way to the Rainbow Family of Living Light Gathering in North Routt County when they were arrested June 26.
The men admitted that they jumped a fence and took fruits and vegetables from the garbage area at Sweet Pea. They originally were charged with felony second-degree burglary and misdemeanor theft. They accepted the plea agreement offered by Assistant District Attorney Kerry St. James, they said, because they did not want to risk being convicted of a felony.
"Once I found out what these guys were being charged with, I contacted (St. James)," said Jonathon Hieb, who owns Sweet Pea with Katherine Zambrana. "I told him, 'We're not behind this prosecution. We don't want anything to do with it.' I thought for sure my input would have some kind of bearing, but he wasn't hearing any of it."
Hieb said St. James told him he was going to make an example of the men.
On Friday, St. James said it was the men's decision to accept the plea agreement. He would not comment on suggestions that he was trying to make an example of Charlé and Siller. St. James was not available Saturday for comment. Neither was his boss, District Attorney Bonnie Roesink.
Hieb said police contacted him the night of the incident. Police said a neighbor had reported suspicious men at the store after hours.
When first contacted by police, Hieb said he would press charges. He said the men were found with a Sweet Pea Produce bag, which generally only could be acquired from inside the store. He didn't want them released until he knew what might be missing from or damaged inside the store.
But Hieb said an inspection showed the men never entered the store and must have found one of the store's bags in the trash area. When police gave Hieb and Zambrana paperwork to fill out and offer their side of what happened, Hieb and Zambrana declined and said they did not want to press charges.
"Immediately - the next day - we said, 'We don't want anything to do with this,'" Hieb said.
Hieb said he later learned from Wayne Westphale, the men's attorney, that they were facing felony charges. Hieb said he agreed with Westphale's suggestion of 10 to 20 hours of community service as an appropriate punishment. Westphale could not be reached Saturday for comment.
"These guys jumped over the fence and got some over-ripe produce. What they did, at most, was a temporary slip of judgment," Hieb said. "These guys are not criminals. For them to be in jail is ridiculous."
Charlé most recently worked as a social worker. Siller is an Americorps volunteer and a yoga instructor. Both men had plans to go to graduate school, family and friends said.
The men could have accepted a lesser jail sentence.
"They had a choice between accepting a deferred felony with 90 days in jail or a misdemeanor conviction with six months in jail," St. James said Friday. "It came down to whether they wanted a felony conviction with less jail time or a misdemeanor with more jail."
St. James also asked Judge James Garrecht to fine the men $42 for each day they serve in jail, the standard cost of care for inmates. Garrecht refused.
Kris Hammond, a Steamboat Springs attorney, met with the men when they sought a second opinion in their case. Hammond, like Westphale, advised the men to plead to the misdemeanor and accept the six-month sentence.
"The way I put it to them was, 'Could you win your case? Yes. But am I willing to gamble a felony conviction that you're going to win? No,'" Hammond said Saturday.
Hammond said there really was no choice. If they pleaded guilty to the felony, he said, the men faced four years of supervised probation before their records would have been cleared. Also, they would have had to apply for an interstate transfer to serve their probation outside of Colorado.
"Defendants are given these kinds of choices every day," Hammond said. "This one is particularly egregious, but the same kind of thing goes on in a lot of cases."
Shaune McCarthy Charlé, Giles Charlé's mother, said the men talked to several attorneys, who all advised them to take the misdemeanor deal.
"We've been working on this all summer long," she said. "We just felt like we were completely helpless. Everyone said there was no hope, no hope, no hope. We're absolutely flabbergasted by what has happened."
Hammond said there is little recourse for the men now, barring a decision by the DA's office to amend the agreement and shorten the sentence.
"My job is to defend my clients no matter what," Hammond said. "The DA's job is to seek justice, not just a conviction. It's hard to see the justice in this."
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Global Chaos
Calderon prepares for victory in Mexico
By WILL WEISSERT
Associated Press
September 5, 2006
MEXICO CITY - Ruling-party presidential candidate Felipe Calderon quietly prepared for victory while his leftist opponent vowed to never concede defeat hours before Mexico's top electoral court was to announce a final ruling in the hotly disputed July elections - an unappealable decision expected to favor Calderon.
Tuesday's long-awaited ruling by the Federal Electoral Tribunal - which comes two months, three days, and tens of thousands of pages of legal challenges after voters cast their ballots - is unlikely to end potentially explosive protests or close the growing political divide gripping the country.
"The court is going to say, 'The election was valid and Calderon is the president and that's the end of it,'" said political analyst Oscar Aguilar. "But that won't turn the page. That won't end anything."
Hundreds of supporters of leftist candidate Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador set up an overnight camp at the court's headquarters late Monday, vowing to prevent the judges from declaring Calderon president.
Most of the court's rulings so far have favored Calderon, who has a 240,000-vote advantage over Lopez Obrador. During an early morning session, the seven magistrates will give their final count in the election and decide whether it was valid. While they have the power to annul the election, there are no signs they plan to do so. The court's decision is final and cannot be appealed.
Both sides appeared to agree that the judges would confirm a Calderon victory in the July 2 election.
"We are very calm, very sure," Juan Camilo Mourino, who heads Calderon's transition team, said Monday. "Tomorrow, Felipe Calderon will be president-elect."
Lopez Obrador, who previously has indicated that he expects the court to decide in Calderon's favor, barely made mention of the impending decision Monday during his nightly address to followers in Mexico City's historic central plaza, the Zocalo.
Instead, he focused on an upcoming national convention of his supporters to decide if he should declare himself head of a parallel government. Members of that government would then go on to vote on a series of reforms to the country's institutions.
"This movement is now about transforming the country," he said.
"What we are proposing now could just be a dream - maybe it won't bear fruit, maybe it will be that we fail - but you know what we have? We have confidence, and above all the responsibility to do it," he later added. "The dreams of the men and women of today will be the realities of tomorrow."
The convention is planned for Sept. 16, Mexico's Independence Day, in the Zocalo, where the armed forces traditionally mass for a march down Mexico City's main Reforma avenue. Both places have been occupied by protesters for more than a month.
Lopez Obrador and his supporters claim fraud, illicit government spending and dirty tricks swayed the election in favor of Calderon, a member of President Vicente Fox's National Action Party.
Mexican presidents are limited by the constitution to one, six-year term, and Fox leaves office Dec. 1.
Protesters say they won't go home until Lopez Obrador is declared president - and a court ruling in Calderon's favor will just fuel their fight.
Another potentially explosive confrontation could come well before inauguration day. Shortly before midnight Sept. 15, Fox is expected to visit the capital's central plaza to yell "Viva Mexico!" and kick off the country's Independence Day celebrations. But the city center has been overrun by protesters supporting Lopez Obrador who may try to keep him from speaking.
"For Mexico, in historical terms, that could be like a political Waterloo," said Homero Aridjis, a poet and newspaper columnist. "A lot of things will be decided. It could be the final political defeat for Fox, or the moment in which he regains a little credibility."
Gabriel Juarez, who was among those blocking Reforma, said Fox's administration has pressured the court to favor Calderon.
"Its rulings are lies," the 70-year-old retiree said.
Business leaders said Monday they plan to file lawsuits against Mexico City's government and Lopez Obrador's party, alleging they are responsible for $369 million in lost revenues due to the protests. Lopez Obrador's Democratic Revolution Party controls the capital's government and has refused to remove the protesters, supplying them with electricity and police protection.
Tensions spilled from the streets to the halls of Congress on Friday, when lawmakers from Lopez Obrador's party the podium of the legislature and blocked Fox from delivering his final state-of-the-nation address.
The party has also pledged to keep Calderon from being sworn in before Congress on Dec. 1.
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Missile fired at McCain escort helicopter during European visit
Kevin Curran
12 News
Sept. 3, 2006
A missile was fired at a helicopter escorting Sen. John McCain during a visit to the Republic of Georgia last week.
A statement from that nation's interior ministry says the surface-to-air missile was aimed at a chopper involved in a visit of a U.S. Senate delegation to the former Soviet republic. McCain was mentioned as the leader of the group.
The ministry statement claims American officials were notified of the incident. State Dept. spokeswoman Joanne Moore told the Associated Press she had no information about the reported attack.
The president of Georgia, Mikhail Saakashvili, is a strong ally of the U.S. He is also trying to re-establish control over two regions of the country trying to break away from the central government.
Word of this missile launch was made as part of a statement about a Sunday attack on a helicopter carrying Georgia's defense minister. His aircraft was damaged by large-caliber machine gun fire and forced to make an emergency landing. No one was injured.
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Leaked memo fuels speculation over Blair resignation
by Michael Thurston
AFP
September 5, 2006
LONDON - Pressure mounted further on British Prime Minister Tony Blair to name a resignation date after a leaked memo set out his "exit strategy," fueling already intense speculation about his plans.
The sense of growing urgency was also bolstered by media reports that Labour MPs are circulating at least one letter calling openly for him to go, while a new poll showed Labour losing ground to the opposition Conservatives.
"Time is not an unlimited commodity," warns the leaked Downing Street memo, drawn up by Blair's closest advisors, which urges him to "go with the crowds wanting more" -- hinting that he should not drag out his departure.
"As TB (Tony Blair) enters his final phase he needs to be focusing way beyond the finishing line, not looking at it... He should be the star who won't even play that last encore," added the five-page document, reported by the Labour-supporting tabloid Daily Mirror.
Blair, who came to power in 1997, has said he will step down before the next general election, due May 2010 at the latest.
But the pledge has turned against him, fueling increasing turmoil within his own party about who will succeed him -- Chancellor Gordon Brown has long been the frontrunner -- and, crucially, when.
Defying pressure, Blair again refused to set a specific date for his much-anticipated resignation in an interview with The Times published last week.
His own backbenchers are becoming increasingly restive, and on Tuesday the daily Guardian reported that the majority of the 38 Labour MPs elected at the 2001 general election have drafted a letter calling for Blair to step aside.
An unnamed MP told the newspaper: "If the prime minister has decided that to set a timetable will undermine his authority, and his authority is already undermined, the obvious thing is for him to go now."
But Blair again refused to be drawn in a breakfast TV interview Tuesday.
"When we have policies for the National Health Service, I hope the National Health Service is going to be there in 50 years' time but I'm not going to be," he told GMTV. "The business of government carries on."
The BBC also reported late on Monday that at least three letters are circulating among Labour MPs calling for Blair to step down, one of which says he should do so immediately.
The broadcaster said that one letter was confined to the 2005 intake of Labour MPs, and that another was circulating among the 2001 intake, citing unnamed sources on both occasions.
A reporter for the BBC's evening current affairs programme also said that one unnamed source told him that there is a third letter, confined to low-ranking members of the government, or parliamentary aides. According to the BBC, none of the letters has been delivered to the prime minister.
News of the letters coincided with the publication of a Populus poll in The Times on Tuesday showing support for Labour fell while the opposition Conservatives held their ground.
Of the 1,504 people surveyed by Populus for The Times, 32 percent supported Labour, a two percentage point decline since July, while 36 percent declared support for the Conservatives.
Tuesday's poll is the latest in a string of such surveys indicating support for Labour is dropping -- a YouGov poll published in The Daily Telegraph last month showed support for the Tories at 38 percent, with Labour at 31 percent.
Blair faces more calls for him to set a date for his departure at Labour's upcoming party conference at the end of the month.
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Russia cancels military exercise with US
AFP
September 5, 2006
MOSCOW - Joint Russian-US military exercises scheduled to take place in western Russia later this month have been cancelled due to questions about the "status" of US military personnel.
"The reason is that the question of the status of American personnel being sent to take part in the exercises has not been resolved," Interfax quoted an unnamed senior Russian defense ministry official as saying.
The exercises involving middle-ranking officers from both countries had been due to take place in the Nizhny Novgorod region, east of Moscow, in the second half of September, he said Tuesday.
A spokesman for the defence ministry would not confirm or deny the report. The US embassy in Moscow said it had no immediate comment.
The official quoted by Interfax did not give details about the status problem, but also referred to a series of protests by Communists who said that US troops should not be allowed on Russian soil because of US foreign policy.
"Emotions being raised over these manoeuvres by certain political forces do not match the scope of the planned exercises," the official said.
The Russian Communist Party had demanded the cancellation of the exercises, threatening to demonstrate across the country on September 14.
"The Communists oppose sabre-rattling on our soil by the army that bombed the sovereign Yugoslavia, trampled the statehood of several countries in the Middle East, and is trying by hook or by crook to perpetuate its military presence in the territory of the former Soviet Union," a communist resolution stated Tuesday, Interfax reported.
Russian-US military exercises have been held periodically since the early 1990s, with manoeuvres in 2004 and 2005 dubbed Torgau, after the name of the German town where Soviet and US troops linked up in the last days of World War II.
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UK Father arrested for refusing to give back boys' ball
UK Daily Mail
03/09/2006
When children playing in his street kicked their football through his hedge for the umpteenth time, Alastair Wood decided enough was enough.
Not only could they not have their ball back, but he was going to keep it until he received an apology.
To his astonishment, however, the 40-year-old father-of-two found himself arrested in his pyjamas, handcuffed and bundled into the back of a police car in front of his wife and crying daughter after being accused of theft.
Yesterday he said: "The whole incident is absolutely beyond belief - words can't describe how ridiculous it all is.
"It's totally changed my attitude towards the police. I just don't have any confidence in them any more."
Construction manager Mr Wood and his wife Joanne, 37, moved into the street in Preston, Lancashire, hoping for a safe neighbourhood in which to raise their children, Liam, 16, and Ellie, six.
But instead he claims they have repeatedly had to endure children kicking footballs through their hedge and into their garden.
"There have been occasions when my wife has been doing our front garden and she's been smacked in the face with a leather football," he added. Matters came to a head when he came across brothers aged 18 and nine scrambling through his hedge trying to retrieve their football.
"One of them asked me if I could get his ball back out of the hedge," he said. "He had been climbing all over the hedge to reach the ball, so I got hold of it and carried on walking up the pathway.
"The youngest child then started having a tantrum and started screaming and shouting that he wanted his ball back.
"I just thought if he can't ask for the ball back politely, then he's not going to get it back at all. So I put the ball in the house and thought nothing more of it."
Mr Wood claims the boys' father, Stephen Burns - who works for the Crown Prosecution Service - came round to confront him, leaving him so worried that he rang the police.
Two days later a community support officer called round and urged him to return the ball, saying it could technically be treated as theft, but Mr Wood said he would not back down until he received an apology.
At that point he expected common sense to prevail - but instead the day after a Pc came round and threatened to arrest him on his doorstep on suspicion of theft if he did not back down.
"I said 'Look, we've been through this, I'm not going to give the ball back unless I get an apology'."
So he faced the humiliation of being handcuffed and marched to a patrol car in front of his neighbours while his daughter looked on in tears. But events turned into a farce as the officer decided not to take him to the station but instead drove him to the nearby church hall and instructed him to thrash it out with his local councillor - still in his pyjamas and dressing gown.
"I think the police realised that they had no power to keep me detained so they'd scored an own goal, so to speak," he said.
Finally, Mr Wood decided things had gone far enough and returned the football to Mr Burns, receiving "a sort of apology".
"He told me he's going to be sending the kids to a park to play football instead, so that's some progress I suppose."
Mr Burns said yesterday he had had no contact with the police and did not know anything about his neighbour's arrest.
But he added: "If you don't return someone's property, I would have thought it was perfectly right under English law to be arrested for theft."
Lancashire Police said they had been called to deal with a dispute between neighbours.
"One man was arrested when he refused to return a football," a spokesman said. "After talks with the arresting officer he agreed to return the ball and apologised.
"He was then de-arrested and the matter appeared resolved."
Earlier this year the Daily Mail told how 68-year-old Roy Markham, from Cubbington, Warwickshire, was arrested for theft after a football from his police sergeant neighbour Stewart Bosworth's garden smashed into his greenhouse.
Warwickshire Police are investigating after Mr Markham complained about his treatment. Last night Mr Wood said he was considering following suit.
Comment: A sign on the road to an overtly fascist form of government in the UK.
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Ozzie Police caught red-handed
Herald Sun
03/09/2006
THE fingerprints of up to half a million innocent Victorians have been retained illegally by Victoria Police.
Senior police have warned the scandal could expose the force to a fine totalling millions of dollars.
Leaked documents, seen by the Sunday Herald Sun, reveal it could take police two decades to clear a backlog of hundreds of thousands of fingerprint sets.
The documents blame a staff shortage for the dilemma.
"There are a number of fingerprints on the database that should have been destroyed and this represents a risk to the Chief Commissioner through contravention of the Crimes Act," the documents state.
Under the Act, fingerprints must be destroyed within six months if they do not give rise to criminal charges, although police may apply to the courts for an extension.
Failure to destroy a set of prints carries a fine of up to $1000.
The State Opposition estimates that between 400,000 and 500,000 fingerprints that should have been destroyed remain on file with Victoria Police.
Opposition police spokesman Kim Wells said: "The Victoria Police is an organisation you would expect to abide by the law, so I'm gobsmacked by this."
The documents say that specialist forensic officers have been called in to help clear the backlog, raising fears that progress on major criminal investigations has suffered.
Victoria Police has allocated two extra staff members to help tackle the problem.
A police spokesman said: "It is about priorities. Our main one is processing forensic evidence to get criminals off our streets.
"A strategy is in place to rectify the situation. We take our legislative responsibilities very seriously."
A spokesperson for Police Minister Tim Holding said: "The Bracks Government expects Victoria Police to comply with all elements of the legisla-
tion regarding fingerprint destruction."
The documents say measures are in place to stop the prints, which date back as far as 1994, being used.
Det-Supt Paul Sheridan backs warnings from the Forensic Services Department's Fingerprint Branch manager that the Chief Commissioner is breaking the law.
"I reiterate the comments . . . that the Chief Commissioner is in contravention of the Crimes Act and could be subject to penalty," he says in the documents.
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An Unimaginable Loss of Life
Bill Fletcher
Black Commentator
05/09/2006
"Since 1997, approximately 4 million people have been killed as a result of the civil war (and foreign interventions) in the Congo. That comes down to approximately 444,000 per year or 37,000 per month or about 1,200 per day."
As the actual events and details surrounding the alleged terrorist plot to blow up commercial airliners unfold, the fear and foreboding that has lived within many of us since 9/11 resurfaced. Yet, in the initial announcement of the alleged plot, there was a reference by a British official that caught my attention. Describing the alleged plot, this official went on to say that the outcome of such bombings would be an unimaginable loss of life.
Before going any further, let me be clear that as far as I am concerned, any attack on non-combatants is criminal and should be condemned. Yet, in thinking about the comment by the British official, my first and continuing response was: Unimaginable to whom? The probable numbers of people who would have been killed might have gone as high as 15,000 (a very rough guess). As someone who just flew back from the West Coast, I would not look forward to flying on a plane that was the target of a terrorist attack. Nevertheless, in today's world, 15,000 dead civilians is not an unimaginable figure, unless, of course, one means 15,000 dead civilians from Western Europe, the United States or Canada.
I do not wish to be harsh or unsympathetic, but let's count a few numbers and you tell me what conclusions you come to. Since 1997, approximately 4 million people have been killed as a result of the civil war (and foreign interventions) in the Congo. That comes down to approximately 444,000 per year or 37,000 per month or about 1,200 per day. I would call that figure unimaginable (even though it happened), or perhaps inconceivable in the sense that this planet has permitted 4 million people to die with very little international attention. Or, a few miles to the north, in the Sudan, over 20 years, more than 2 million people were killed in the north/south civil war that recently ended. In the Darfur region of the Sudan, more than 400,000 people (not part of the 2 million) have died as a result of the government-backed genocide, and this number starts around 2003. Or, if we wish to be more modest, we can see the more than 1,000 Lebanese civilians killed as a result of Israel's collective punishment of that country, a collective punishment that has specifically targeted civilians and civilian targets, this from an allegedly civilized nation. Should I mention Iraq? More than 2,600 U.S. personnel dead and by most reports more than 100,000 Iraqis dead as a result of an illegal war (by the way, that is more than 30,000 dead per year or about 80 dead per day). This does not count the hundreds of thousands of Iraqis who died as a result of the US/British sanctions against pre-war Iraq.
So, I found myself wondering about this term "unimaginable loss of life." The potential tragedy of a terrorist attack on civilian aircraft would deserve condemnation should even one person die as a result. But telling us about an unimaginable loss of life when the government of Britain, let alone the United States, has been prepared to sit back and watch or participate in the massive loss of life in countries of the global South is nothing short of disingenuous.
This returns us to an issue that I have raised in previous columns, i.e., the relative importance or unimportance of the lives of different peoples. Four million dead in the Congo is absolutely unimaginable. It is difficult to even count to 4 million sitting in the same place. It is unimaginable that so many people could lose their lives and yet the Congo has to fight to get the attention of major news media in Western Europe, the United States and Canada. Short of a titillating incident or an obvious and gross atrocity, the loss of 1200 people per day does not seem to merit our consideration.
Perhaps I have a different imagination?
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Targeting Iran
Merkel rules out military option for Iran
www.chinaview.cn
2006-09-05
BERLIN (Xinhua) -- German Chancellor Angela Merkel said there is "no military option" for handling Iran's
"The chancellor has expressed the view that there is no military option," Ulrich Wilhelm said, adding that "the door for negotiations remains open."
The U.S. leaders have said repeatedly any option would not be ruled out in dealing with Iran's nuclear program as they insist that Iran is developing nuclear weapons.
But Iran has said its program is for peaceful purpose, refusing to comply with a UN directive that it cease uranium enrichment by Aug. 31.
Senior diplomats from Britain, France and Germany will meet their counterparts from the United States, Russia and China in Berlin on Thursday to discuss the Iranian nuclear crisis.
European Union chief diplomat Javier Solana is expected to hold talks with Iranian negotiators this week.
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Full Text of Pres. Ahmadinejad's Letter to German Chancellor
Fars News Agency
28/08/2006
TEHRAN - Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad recently forwarded a letter to the German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
This was President Ahmadinejad's second letter to the heads of western states, considering an earlier one he wrote to the US President, George W. Bush.
Unlike his first letter to Bush, President Ahmadinejad in his letter to Merkel, has touched on his country's nuclear issue, where he has stressed that Iran's decision for the acquisition of the nuclear technology is irrevocable.
What follows is the full text of President Ahmadinejad's letter to the German Chancellor.
In the Name of God, the Merciful, the Compassionate
Her Excellency Angela Merkel
The Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany
Excellency,
Please accept my warmest greetings.
If it had not been for Germany being a great contributor to progress in science, philosophy, literature, arts and politics;
If it had not been for a more important and positive influence of Germany in international relations and promotion of peace;
Moreover, if it had not been for the persistence of a strong will by certain global powers and special groups to constantly portray Germany as defeated and indebted country of World War II in order to continue their extortions;
And if it had not been for the presence of Your Excellency at the top of the executive branch of your country as an experienced stateswoman with bitter and sweet experiences in two dissimilar societies with different political systems and traditions,
And at the same time, if it had not been for the advantages that are limited to women, such as stronger human sentiments and certain manifestations of the divine compassion and kindness, specially in the position of a mother and being at the service of the people, and the common responsibility of all people with faith in God to defend human dignity and worth and to prevent violations of their rights and their humiliation, and proceeding from this conviction that we are all created by the Almighty and He has bestowed upon us all dignity and no one has any special privileges over the other, and under no circumstances could a society be deprived of its rights, barred from pursuit of progress and perfection or be controlled or humiliated;
Finally, if it had not been for the oppression, however different, of our nations, our shared responsibility to promote justice as the most basic foundation for promotion of peace and human equality, I would not have found the motive to write this letter.
Honorable Chancellor
Rulers come and go, but people with culture and history and their attachments and desires will keep on staying. Opportunities in front of those in position of high power are transient, even if they may be vast and broad. These opportunities are very auspicious and can play a key role in the negative and positive transformations and developments of a nation.
Those in position of high power do not normally have many opportunities, but are accountable before the Almighty and people due to their high responsibility. We know this, and you know it as well.
Some of these developments can have regional, continental and global ramifications and can hardly be overlooked.
For sometime I have been thinking why some nations that their history shows they have indeed had an important and prominent share and role in material and spiritual progress of mankind in various arenas of science, arts, philosophy, literature and politics and were makers of civilization are not allowed to be proud as a nation of their historical accomplishments and play their deserved and constructive role on the global arena. They try to keep the black cloud of humiliation and shame hanging over their heads. And even more regrettably, some of the leaders of such a nation regard this situation befitting them and their nation and try to justify it. This is really an astonishing phenomenon in today's world. The propaganda machinery after World War II has been so colossal that has caused some people to believe that they are the guilty party by historical accounts and must pay the penalty fort the wrongs committed by their forefathers for successive generations and for indefinite period of time.
Excellency
World War II came to an end with all its material and moral losses and its 60 million casualties. The death of human beings is tragic and sad. In all divine religions and before all awakened conscience and pure nature of mankind and the sense of right and wrong, the life, property and honor of people, regardless of their religious persuasion and ethnic background, must be respected at all times and all places.
Sixty years have passed since the end of the war. But, regrettably the entire world and some nations in particular are still facing its consequences. Even now the conduct of some bullying powers and power-seeking and aggressive groups is the conduct of victors with the vanquished.
The extortion and blackmail continue, and people are not allowed to think about or even question the source of this extortion, otherwise they face imprisonment. When will this situation end? Sixty years, one hundred years or one thousand years, when? I am sorry to remind you that today the perpetual claimants against the great people of Germany are the bullying powers and the Zionists that founded the Al-Qods Occupying Regime with the force of bayonets in the Middle East.
The Honorable Chancellor
I have no intention of arguing about the Holocaust. But, does it not stand to reason that some victorious countries of World War II intended to create an alibi on the basis of which they could continue keeping the defeated nations of World War II indebted to them. Their purpose has been to weaken their morale and their inspiration in order to obstruct their progress and power. In addition to the people of Germany, the peoples of the Middle East have also borne the brunt of the Holocaust. By raising the necessity of settling the survivors of the Holocaust in the land of Palestine, they have created a permanent threat in the Middle East in order to rob the people of the region of the opportunities to achieve progress. The collective conscience of the world is indignant over the daily atrocities by the Zionist occupiers, destruction of homes and farms, killing of children, assassinations and bombardments.
Excellency, you have seen that the Zionist government does not even tolerate a government elected by the Palestinian people, and over and over again has demonstrated that it recognizes no limit in attacking the neighboring countries.
The question is why did the victors of the war, especially England that had apparently such a strong sense of responsibility toward the survivors of the Holocaust not allow them to settle in their territory. Why did they force them to migrate to other people's land by launching a wave of anti-Semitism? Using the excuse for the settlement of the survivors of the Holocaust, they encouraged the Jews worldwide to migrate and today a large part of the inhabitants of the occupied territories are non-European Jews. If tyranny and killing is condemned in one part of the world, can we acquiesce and go along with tyranny, killing, occupation and assassinations in another part of the world simply in order to redress the past wrongs?
Excellency
We need to ask ourselves that for what purposes the millions of dollars that the Zionists receive from the treasury of some Western countries are spent for. Are they used for the promotion of peace and the well-being of the people? Or are they used for waging war against Palestinians and the neighboring countries. Are the nuclear arsenals of Israel intended to be used in defense of the survivors of the Holocaust or as a permanent thereat against nations of the region and as an instrument of coercion, and possibly to defend the interests of certain circles of power in the Western countries.
Regrettably, the influence of the Zionists in the economy, media and some centers of political power has endangered interests of the European nations and has robbed them of many opportunities. The main alibi for this approach is the extortion they exact from the Holocaust.
One can imagine what standing some European countries could have had and what global role they could have played, if it had not been for this sixty-year old imposition.
I believe we both share the view that the flourishing of nations and their role are directly related to freedom and sense of pride.
Fortunately, with all the pressures and limitations, the great nation of Germany has been able to take great strides toward advancement and has become a major economic powerhouse in Europe that also seeks to play a more effective role in international interactions. But just imagine where Germany would be today in terms of its eminence among the freedom-loving nations, Muslims of the world and peoples of Europe, if such a situation did not exist and the governments in power in Germany had said no to the extortions by the Zionists and had not supported the greatest enemy of mankind.
It is sad to admit that Europe has lost a lot of its clout in global interactions and has not been able to face and overcome major challenges by relying on itself. This is, of course, understandable. The big powers outside of the continent intend to prove that Europe cannot rely on itself and do anything without their help and intervention.
Our people have also suffered from the interventions by some of the victors of the war after World War II. For many years they interfered in our internal affairs and did not want to see our nation conquer the pinnacles of progress and perfection. They had their eyes on our natural wealth, above all on our energy resources. To secure their own interests, they overthrew the legally constituted government of the time, installed a dictatorial regime and supported it to the end. Later, they supported Saddam in the war imposed on our people and observed no humanitarian boundary in their support for the Iraqi dictator. Our nation has experienced the pain and anguish from the interferences of those who are now crying out for human rights. There are still many suffering from the wounds and injuries of this war.
Many of these aggressions have taken place by those who regard themselves the victors of the World War II. They allow themselves to do whatever they wish, and unfortunately, after the end of the Cold War, the arrogance and expansionist ambitions of these powers have escalated.
We believe that still a major part of the peoples of the world and even international organizations are under the influence of the behavior and the conduct of the victors of the World War II.
I explained the position of the people and government of the Islamic Republic of Iran at the United Nations General Assembly. Is the present state of affairs such as the rules governing the work of the Security Council, especially the right to veto, fair?
Do you not think that the time has come to change these rules in cooperation with independent governments? These rules are by no means acceptable to the collective conscience of nations and are contrary to the sense of reason and human nature. At least, if we want to be fairer, some other countries of the world should be allowed to benefit from the right to veto.
Madam Chancellor
You are familiar with the pains and sufferings currently afflicting our world. Today, the pain and suffering of the people of Iraq that come from occupation, absence of security and daily acts of terrorism are tormenting the entire humanity. Relentless interferences of some bullying powers in the internal affairs of other nations, antagonism toward the inalienable rights of nations to have access to more advanced technologies, subjecting nations to permanent threats by relying on arsenals of chemical and nuclear weapons and weapons of mass destruction, opposition to popular governments in Latin America, supporting coup d'état and dictatorial regimes, absence of due attention to Africa and taking advantage of the power vacuum there to plunder their wealth are among the problems facing our world today. In my letter to President Bush, I spelled out a long list of contemporary global problems.
Where are the roots of these problems? How long can they continue? Do you not think that the main root lies in the fact that some of the rulers and powers of today have distanced themselves from the teachings of the divine prophets, the teachings of Abraham, Moses and Jesus Christ (peace be upon him) and the Prophet Mohammad (peace be upon him).
These teachings are in all divine religions that you and I believe:
- God is the creator of all things and beings. We have all been created free and He has not allowed us to be the servant of anyone other than Him.
- He has commanded us to worship Him and to avoid all oppressors and tyrants.
- He has commanded us to be virtuous, to be good to and serve the people, and has directed us to be kind to and defend the oppressed and fight the oppressors.
- God has given humans dignity and scorns their humiliation.
- He has sent his messengers with clear reasons, the Book and a balance and has called on his servants to promote justice.
Based on these shared principles and foundations of our faith, we believe:
- Peace and tranquility can only be established and endure on the basis of faith in God and justice.
- Peace and dignity are the rights of all nations.
- Pursuit of progress and better livelihood combined with spirituality, compassion and well-being is the right of people.
- You and we can found a new movement to achieve these noble human ideals by relying on these principles and the articles of faith that are common to all divine religions.
Our nations believe and are committed to these pillars of faith. The history has shown that the people of Iran are not familiar with aggressing and brutalizing other nations. Nevertheless, we do not allow being the subject and victim of aggression and brutality. The experience of the eight-year war clearly demonstrated this fact to the whole world.
I believe we and you have both been the subject of tyranny. They do not respect your rights and want us also to forego our rights. Fortunately, I have heard that you also speak your mind openly and are against engendering tension and wars.
Honorable Chancellor,
The inner instincts and nature of the peoples of the world have wakened up.
Tendency toward faith in the oneness of God is on the rise.
People will no longer tolerate to be tyrannized, humiliated and their rights violated.
The prevailing circumstances today differ from those of yesterday. Multiple standards and approaches in relations will not endure.
Iran and Germany can play a more important role together in the international arena by relying on the noble and high values.
This cooperative relationship can also enhance the role of Europe on the global scene and serve as a model of cooperation between two governments and nations.
Without doubt, cooperation of two peace-loving, powerful and cultured nations of Germany and Iran will serve the interests of Europe as well. Together we must end the present abnormalities in international relations, the type of order and relations that are based on the impositions of the victors of the World War II on the defeated nations. Nations and many governments will be on our side on this path.
We must make the shadow of World War II disappear and help the international community to promote security, freedom and sense of tranquility.
The people of Iran and Germany are two great nations that have contributed to the making of our civilization. They have rich culture and have been in the forefront of science, literature, arts and philosophy. Both of our people have a strong faith in God and follow the teachings of divine prophets. They have also had long-lasting scientific, cultural and commercial relations and share many valuable mutual interests.
I have no doubt that with the cooperation of the two governments and the support of the two great nations we can take great strides forward in alleviating the problems and abnormalities of our world today.
Daring and courageous decisions are the key to our success in overcoming the existing problems, countering the violations of rights and defending the rights of nations.
To the extent that I know of the people of Germany, they will come along and join us and want restore their dignity and influence for the sake of global peace and calm. Our people have the similar spirit.
Together we will be able to prove to some powers that respecting other nations and their rights is good for them as well. Our two nations and governments, next to each other, will be able to play a fundamental role in promoting peace, security, progress, and human dignity at the scale of two countries and internationally.
In closing, I pray to the Almighty for the success of Your Excellency and the government and people of Germany.
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Powers should not isolate Iran: Annan
Reuters
Tue Sep 5, 2006
MADRID - The international community should not isolate
Iran, which has indicated it will cooperate in the reconstruction of Lebanon, United Nations Secretary-General
Kofi Annan told a Spanish newspaper.
"The international community should count on Iran, not isolate it," Annan said in an interview with El Pais in Qatar which was published on Tuesday.
Annan spoke to El Pais after a weekend visit to Tehran as part of a Middle Eastern tour to shore up the ceasefire that ended fighting between Israel and Iranian-backed Lebanese Hizbollah guerrillas.
"The general perception is that Iran is acting on its own, giving money to Hizbollah. In my conversations in Tehran, I asked the Iranians to work with other countries in reconstruction. They accepted my request, which is a very helpful attitude," Annan said.
Iran's stand-off with Western powers over its nuclear program can only be resolved via negotiation, he said.
"The main thing is we have to avoid confrontation. This is an issue which requires patience and perseverance. The viable solution is negotiation," he said.
The United States says Iran, which failed to meet a Security Council deadline to stop enriching uranium, is trying to develop nuclear weapons.
"The Iranians assured me that they are not seeking nuclear weapons and their intentions are peaceful. Nonetheless, they have to find a way of reassuring the world and guaranteeing that these really are their intentions," Annan said.
In the interview, he also called on Israel to make moves to secure peace in Lebanon.
"Israel should withdraw, without needing to wait for the deployment of the 15,000 (international troops) to be complete. Also, mutual trust has to be created, by, for example, Israel lifting its blockade on Lebanon," Annan said.
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Israel plans for war with Iran and Syria
Uzi Mahnaimi, Tel Aviv, and Sarah Baxter, New York
The Sunday Times
September 03, 2006
THREATENED by a potentially nuclear-armed Tehran, Israel is preparing for a possible war with both Iran and Syria, according to Israeli political and military sources.
The conflict with Hezbollah has led to a strategic rethink in Israel. A key conclusion is that too much attention has been paid to Palestinian militants in Gaza and the West Bank instead of the two biggest state sponsors of terrorism in the region, who pose a far greater danger to Israel's existence, defence insiders say.
"The challenge from Iran and Syria is now top of the Israeli defence agenda, higher than the Palestinian one," said an Israeli defence source. Shortly before the war in Lebanon Major-General Eliezer Shkedi, the commander of the air force, was placed in charge of the "Iranian front", a new position in the Israeli Defence Forces. His job will be to command any future strikes on Iran and Syria.
The Israeli defence establishment believes that Iran's pursuit of a nuclear programme means war is likely to become unavoidable.
"In the past we prepared for a possible military strike against Iran's nuclear facilities," said one insider, "but Iran's growing confidence after the war in Lebanon means we have to prepare for a full-scale war, in which Syria will be an important player."
A new infantry brigade has been formed named Kfir (lion cub), which will be the largest in the Israeli army. "It is a partial solution for the challenge of the Syrian commando brigades, which are considered better than Hezbollah's," a military source said.
There has been grave concern in Israel over a military pact signed in Tehran on June 15 between Iran and Syria, which the Iranian defence minister described as a "mutual front against Israeli threats". Israel has not had to fight against more than one army since 1973.
During the war in Lebanon, Ali Akbar Mohtashamipour, the Iranian founder of Hezbollah, warned: "If the Americans attack Iran, Iran will attack Tel Aviv with missiles."
According to the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London, both Iran and Syria have ballistic missiles that can cover most of Israel, including Tel Aviv. An emergency budget has now been assigned to building modern shelters.
"The ineptness of the Israeli Defence Forces against Hezbollah has raised the Iranians' confidence," said a leading defence analyst.
In Washington, the military hawks believe that an airstrike against Iranian nuclear bunkers remains a more straightforward, if risky, operation than chasing Hezbollah fighters and their mobile rocket launchers in Lebanon.
"Fixed targets are hopelessly vulnerable to precision bombing, and with stealth bombers even a robust air defence system doesn't make much difference," said Richard Perle, a leading neoconservative.
The option of an eventual attack remains on the table after President George Bush warned on Friday that Iran must not be allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
While the American State Department favours engaging with President Bashar Assad of Syria in the hope of detaching him from the Iranian alliance, hawks believe Israel missed a golden opportunity to strike at Syria during the Hezbollah conflict.
"If they had acted against Syria during this last kerfuffle, the war might have ended more quickly and better," Perle added. "Syrian military installations are sitting ducks and the Syrian air force could have been destroyed on the ground in a couple of days." Assad set off alarm bells in Israel when he said during the war in Lebanon: "If we do not obtain the occupied Golan Heights by peaceful means, the resistance option is there."
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Fattening You Up for the Slaughter
Health Experts: Obesity Pandemic Looms
By ROHAN SULLIVAN
AP
Sep 3, 2006
SYDNEY, Australia - An obesity pandemic threatens to overwhelm health systems around the globe with illnesses such as diabetes and heart disease, experts at an international conference warned Sunday.
"This insidious, creeping pandemic of obesity is now engulfing the entire world," Paul Zimmet, chairman of the meeting of more than 2,500 experts and health officials, said in a speech opening the weeklong International Congress on Obesity. "It's as big a threat as global warming and bird flu."
The World Health Organization says more than 1 billion adults are overweight and 300 million of them are obese, putting them at much higher risk of diabetes, heart problems, high blood pressure, stroke and some forms of cancer.
Zimmet, a diabetes expert at Australia's Monash University, said there are now more overweight people in the world than the undernourished, who number about 600 million.
People in wealthy countries lead in overeating and not doing enough physical activity, but those in the poorer nations of Asia, Africa and Latin America are quickly learning bad habits, experts said.
Thailand's Public Health Ministry, for instance, announced Sunday that nearly one in three Thais over age 35 is at risk of obesity-related diseases.
"We are not dealing with a scientific or medical problem. We're dealing with an enormous economic problem that, it is already accepted, is going to overwhelm every medical system in the world," said Dr. Philip James, the British chairman of the International Obesity Task Force.
The task force is a section of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, a professional organization of scientists and health workers in some 50 countries that deal with the issue.
James said the cost of treating obesity-related health problems was immeasurable on a global scale, but the group estimated it at billions of dollars a year in countries such as Australia, Britain and the United States.
Among the most worrying problems are skyrocketing rates of obesity among children, which make them much more prone to chronic diseases as they grow older and could shave years off their lives, experts said.
The children in this generation may be the first in history to die before their parents because of health problems related to weight, Kate Steinbeck, an expert in children's health at Sydney's Royal Prince Alfred Hospital, said in a statement.
Experts at the conference said governments should impose bans on junk food advertising aimed directly at children, although they acknowledged such restrictions were unlikely to come about soon because the food industry would lobby hard against them.
"There is going to be a political bun fight over this for some time, but of course we shouldn't advertise junk food to children that makes them fat," said Dr. Boyd Swinburn, a member of the International Obesity Task Force.
Dr. Claude Bouchard, president of the International Association for the Study of Obesity, an umbrella group for medical organizations dealing with weight-related and children's health issues, said the group supported advertising bans as official policy.
But the policy position is unlikely to have any immediate effect on influencing governments to introduce such bans, said Bouchard, head of the Pennington Research Center at Louisiana State University at Baton Rouge.
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Five-year-old girls worried about weight, obesity conference told
AFP
Sep 03, 2006
Girls as young as five are sensitive about their bodies in a "weight-hostile" environment that equates popularity and attractiveness with thinness, an international conference of experts has heard.
And the problems continue through to adult life, where overweight women are at increased risk of depression, the 10th International Congress on Obesity was told.
"Children are sensitive at an increasingly early age to their physical appearance," said Leeds University professor Andrew Hill.
"The impact of being overweight on girls' self-confidence has been detected in children as young as five years.
"Psychological factors such as perceptions of one's attractiveness, physical ability and self-esteem can be improved with even a modest weight loss," he told more than 2,000 delegates to the congress, which is held every four years.
Adult women were also affected psychologically by being overweight, said Deakin University researcher Kylie Ball.
New findings from a major study of women's health in Australia showed that physical inactivity and high body weight in adults were independent predictors of depressive symptoms three years later.
"In other words, the study showed that women who were overweight or obese -- regardless of how much activity they did -- were at increased risk of depressive symptoms three years on," Ball said.
"Women who were physically inactive also had an increased risk of depressive symptoms when surveyed three years later."
The Women's Health Australia project had also shown that obesity may have lasting effects on young women's life satisfaction.
Obese women were less likely to aspire to higher education and were more dissatisfied with work, relationships and social activities than women in a healthy weight range, the study of 7,800 women showed.
"These results have implications for the content of weight-loss programs," Ball said.
"There is a need to address the adverse psychological consequences of high weight gain and help people to be more accepting of their weight and themselves, while assisting them to achieve their goal weight."
The congress, which runs until Friday, is seeking practical methods of combatting what chairman Paul Zimmet called "this insidious, creeping pandemic of obesity now engulfing the entire world".
Obesity is the greatest single contributor to chronic disease and the world now has more fat people than hungry ones, according to World Health Organisation figures.
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Fears of 'extreme' TB strain
Robin McKie, science editor
The Observer
Sunday September 3, 2006
Health experts are to hold an emergency meeting in Johannesburg this week, following the discovery of a deadly new strain of tuberculosis.
The strain - known as extreme drug-resistant TB - has horrified World Health Organisation doctors. In one outbreak in South Africa, 52 of 53 patients died within weeks of becoming infected.
'This new strain leaves us facing a nightmare,' said Paul Nunn, coordinator of the WHO's drug-resistance unit. 'It is resistant to nearly every drug in our arsenal. We are now on the threshold of the appearance of a strain of TB that is resistant to every medicine known to science.'
The strain was originally discovered by scientists earlier this year. They looked at cases of multiple drug-resistant TB - which has developed over the past decade in many parts of the world - and discovered that among these a worrying new 'extreme' strain had evolved.
'Mainstream drugs are ineffective against multiple drug-resistant TB,' said Nunn. 'However, there are half a dozen second-line medicines that can be used to tackle it. Now this new extreme resistant strain has appeared. It is not only resistant to our principal anti-TB drugs, but to many of our second-line defences. In short, we are now on the last line of our defences against tuberculosis.'
Among the areas found to have been affected by extreme drug-resistant TB are Latvia and South Africa. Scientists discovered the strain last month among HIV-infected patients in the Kwazulu-Natal region. 'Fifty two of the 53 infected people are already dead, and the last may well have died by now,' added Nunn.
An estimated 4.5 million people in South Africa have HIV. Extreme drug-resistance TB could devastate the population. 'If countries don't have the diagnostic capacity to find these patients, they will die without proper treatment,' said Nunn.
As a result, WHO is to hold its emergency meeting in Johannesburg to help establish measures that will lead to the rapid diagnosis of the new strain.
'It appears to kill within a few weeks and that does not give us a lot of time to spot it and treat it with the right drugs,' added Nunn. The few classes of drugs that are still effective against this strain of TB are expensive and can be toxic.
The meeting will be attended by officials from WHO and its partners, including the South African Medical Research Council and the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
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GMO Chinese rice found in EU: greens
By Jeremy Smith
Reuters
Tue Sep 5, 2006
BRUSSELS - European consumers are at risk from unauthorized genetically modified (GMO) rice grown in China after evidence of a strain was found in Britain, France and Germany, two leading environment groups said on Tuesday.
The Chinese rice, modified to resist certain insects, was found in samples of rice stick noodles in France and Germany, and also in rice vermicelli in Britain, Greenpeace International said, citing the results of two rounds of laboratory tests.
Its report, compiled with Friends of the Earth Europe, did not indicate the possible quantities involved but said the GMO rice had been detected in different product brands found in Asian specialty stores and Asian restaurants.
Five samples out of 27 tested positive for the unauthorized rice strain, officials at the two groups said.
"Innocent consumers again become the victims of the GE (genetic engineering) industry's 'contamination first' strategy," Greenpeace International GMO campaigner Jeremy Tager said in a statement.
The Chinese rice contained a protein that might cause allergenic reactions in humans, he said. It was supposed to be used only in field trials and was not approved for commercial growing because of concerns about its safety.
Dutch company Heuschen & Schrouff, one of the importers cited in the report, said it was investigating the case and would check with its suppliers.
"We have no comment. This information is very new to us, we received it just half an hour ago. We import the products so we are checking with our suppliers. Our quality department is also involved," commercial manager Bernard van Schaik told Reuters.
Heuschen & Schrouff Oriental Foods Trading BV says it is the market leading distributor of authentic Asian food and non-food in Germany, Austria, and the Benelux countries.
A spokesman for Seewoo Foods Ltd, Britain's largest supplier of Chinese foods which was also cited in the report, was not immediately available for comment.
The discovery of the experimental rice comes just a few weeks after the European Union tightened requirements on U.S. long-grain imports to prove the absence of another biotech rice type detected in samples intended for commercial use.
The EU does not yet permit the sale, import or marketing of any biotech rice on the territory of its 25 member countries.
European consumers are well known for their wariness over GMO foods, but the biotech industry says its products are perfectly safe and are no different to conventional foods.
"Once illegal GE crops are in the food chain, removing them takes enormous effort and cost. It is easier to prevent contamination in the first place," Tager said.
Last month the EU-25 tightened requirements on U.S. long-grain rice imports to prove the absence of the GMO strain LL Rice 601 marketed by Germany's Bayer AG and produced in the United States.
The EU decision followed the discovery by U.S. authorities of trace amounts of LL Rice 601, engineered to resist a herbicide, in long-grain samples targeted for commercial use.
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EU healthcare 'must brace for revolution'
By Andrew Bounds and George Parker in Brussels
Financial Times
September 4, 2006
Europe's public healthcare systems must brace for radical change as barriers to patients crossing borders to seek treatment drop, the European Union's top health official said on Monday.
Markos Kyprianou, EU health commissioner, told the Financial Times that he would act to implement the right of patients to travel for treatment across the 25-member bloc in the wake of recent court judgments.
While so-called health tourism is on the rise, many EU members have argued that medical services fall outside the scope of its single market.
But the European Court of Justice has found that they do not. In a ruling in May on the case of British woman Yvonne Watts, who went to France to avoid a year-long wait for a hip operation, the court said patients facing "undue delay" should be entitled to be treated in other countries and paid for by their national health systems.
Mr Kyprianou said: "The internal market applies to health services. People can shop around."
Opening the market could provide lucrative opportunities for private providers to lure clients from across Europe.
The move would have big budget implications for countries such as the UK, which effectively rations healthcare by limiting capacity and having long waiting lists. EU health spending rose from an average 7 per cent of gross domestic product to 7.7 per cent between 2000 and 2003.
On Tuesday Mr Kyprianou will launch a debate, requested by member states, in the European Commission that will lead to proposals within months for how the market should function.
"We need to give people information. For example, if you want a hip replacement, where do you go, which country? There must be a better way to help the citizen make a choice," he said. "On the other hand, can a receiving country turn down a patient?"
About 1 per cent of operations across the EU involve people from other countries. Defining "undue delay" will be one thorny issue. "I am not going to produce a list of time limits," Mr Kyprianou said. There is also the question of liability if an operation goes wrong and who should pay for follow-up treatment when the patient returns home.
Patients could only travel for treatment that would be available in their own country and at the same price. They would have to meet extra costs themselves.
Jim Murray, director of European consumer lobby group BEUC, welcomed the debate. "Patients need much more clarification of their rights," he said.
Although José Manuel Barroso, the liberal president of the European Commission, wants to go further. Many members insisted health be excluded from a recently-agreed EU directive to liberalise trade in services.
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Weathering It Out
Montana wildfire still spreading
AP
Mon Sep 4, 2006
BIG TIMBER, Mont. - An enormous wildfire that has prompted the evacuation of hundreds of people continued to spread Monday, though winds didn't kick up as much as firefighters had feared, a Forest Service official said.
"We're still working on this thing on all fronts," said Dixie Dees, a fire information officer.
The fire, in south-central Montana, has burned 26 homes and is classified as the nation's No. 1 firefighting priority.
It has spread across 180,000 acres, or more than 280 square miles, since lightning sparked it on Aug. 22. It was only about 20 percent contained, authorities said.
The fire is not following the typical pattern: growing more active in the afternoon, then calming as darkness falls, Dies said.
"We'll probably have an active fire until midnight or so before it quiets down," she said.
About 265 homes were evacuated in just a few hours Sunday night on the western flank of the fast-moving blaze, said Kelly O'Connell, Sweetgrass County disaster and emergency services coordinator.
Fire officials feared that wind and higher temperatures this week would create extreme fire conditions.
The fire was spreading on its southwest side Monday, fire information officer Char Fuller said. Crews were trying to protect buildings, particularly along the western flank.
"They're trying to do operations to protect those structures, but they're not making any guarantees," O'Connell said. "They're just working as hard as they can."
About 770 firefighters and support personnel are working the blaze, on the ground and with helicopters and heavy air tankers. Fire officials have ordered more people and equipment to help fight the fire in anticipation of a difficult week.
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Ice core evidence of human impact on CO2 in air
Reuters
Mon Sep 4, 2006
NORWICH - Air from the oldest ice core confirms human activity has increased the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere to levels not seen for hundreds of thousands of years, scientists said on Monday.
Bubbles of air in the 800,000-year-old ice, drilled in the Antarctic, show levels of CO2 changing with the climate. But the present levels are out of the previous range.
"It is from air bubbles that we know for sure that carbon dioxide has increased by about 35 percent in the last 200 years," said Dr Eric Wolff of the British Antarctic Survey and the leader of the science team for the 10-nation European Project for Ice Coring in Antarctica.
"Before the last 200 years, which man has been influencing, it was pretty steady," he added.
The natural level of CO2 over most of the past 800,000 years has been 180-300 parts per million by volume (ppmv) of air. But today it is at 380 ppmv.
"The most scary thing is that carbon dioxide today is not just out of the range of what happened in the last 650,000 years but already up 100 percent out of the range," Wolff said at the British Association Festival of Science in Norwich, eastern England.
CO2 was close to 280 ppmv from 1000 AD until 1800 and then it accelerated toward its present concentration. Wolff added that measurements of carbon isotopes showed the extra CO2 coming from a fossil source, due to increased human activity.
The ice core record showed it used to take about 1,000 years for a CO2 increase of 30 ppmv. It has risen by that much in the last 17 years alone.
"We really are in a situation where something is happening that we don't have any analog for in our records. It is an experiment that we don't know the result of," he added.
Professor Peter Smith, of the University of Nottingham in England, said the study showed more needed to be done.
"There is an urgent need to find innovative technologies to reduce the impact we are having on our climate," he told the science conference.
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Race is on to save the Dead Sea
Robert Booth
The Sunday Times
September 03, 2006
LORD FOSTER, the British architect, has been enlisted by the King of Jordan for his most grandiose project yet - a canal carved through the Sinai desert to rescue the Dead Sea from environmental disaster.
He has already held talks with the governments of Israel and Jordan about a $3 billion scheme to transfer water from the Red Sea to the Dead Sea.
His proposal is to carry sea water from the Gulf of Aqaba to replenish the Dead Sea, which has shrunk by a third over the past 50 years and faces total evaporation. At stake is the area's delicate ecology and a tourist industry - that draws 100,000 Britons each year - centred on the sea's mineral-rich waters and mud.
A sequence of canals and pipelines would channel sea water down through the arid Arava valley in southern Israel and Jordan to the salt lake at the lowest point on earth, 415 metres below sea level.
Action is urgently needed. Over the past 50 years the Dead Sea's depth has fallen by 20 metres. The so-called "Red to Dead" plan is to reverse this fall, which has been so dramatic that it has left the Israeli spa resort of Ein Gedi a mile from the water's edge.
Foster's intervention is the latest in a series of increasingly ambitious schemes by the architect. Last month he revealed plans for the 2,000ft Moscow City Tower, to cost £830m and house 25,000 people, and he is building the world's largest new airport in Beijing.
Now 71, he has timed his proposal to coincide with an agreement between the leaders of Jordan, Israel and the Palestinian Authority to spend a $15m World Bank grant on investigating the feasibility of a canal project.
Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, and Mahmoud Abbas, the Palestinian president, have recently signed letters expressing their commitment to the project, despite the conflict between Hezbollah and Israel. The study will be financed by France, America, the Netherlands and Japan.
It is understood that Foster has personally promoted his version of the plan in informal meetings with senior Israeli officials over the last 18 months, and with a presentation in Amman to representatives of Jordan's King Abdullah.
The one metre a year fall in the level of the Dead Sea has already left the surrounding terrain unstable and prone to cave in, which puts roads, hotels and chemical plants around the sea in jeopardy. Oases have also been disrupted, affecting bird migrations and desert wildlife, including ibex, gazelles and even leopards.
According to Gidon Bromberg, the Israeli director of Friends of the Earth in the Middle East, the reduction has been caused by the diversion of the River Jordan, which feeds the Dead Sea, for irrigation and drinking water - mostly by Israel, but also by Jordan and Syria. Today, less than 7% of the river's original flow reaches the sea.
"A river holy to half of humanity has been reduced to little more than an open sewer," said Bromberg.
Guy Battle, Foster's environmental engineer on the project, said this weekend that the plan includes vast desalination plants along the canal to provide fresh water to make the desert bloom and supply drinking water. It is hoped that these facilities, which use the heat of the desert sun to evaporate sea water under a translucent bubble roof, could help reduce regional disputes over water.
Ariel Sharon, the ailing former Israeli prime minister, once called Israel's diversion of the River Jordan in 1964 the spark that led to the six day war in 1967. Palestinians are still forbidden to sink new wells.
Foster's office confirmed that he had completed preliminary studies and said the firm was awaiting further instruction from the Jordanian government.
An aide to Shimon Peres, the Israeli deputy prime minister, said: "We have had talks with the Jordanians, and they want to advance this. King Abdullah wants it the most because most of [the structure] would be built in Jordan."
The three-way project had the potential to boost the peace process, said Peres.
At the northern end of the route, there would be a hydro-electric plant.
However, Friends of the Earth warned that mixing water from the Red Sea with the unique chemical soup of the Dead Sea could create a natural catastrophe. "The [Dead Sea's] mix of bromide, potash, magnesium and salt is like no other body of water on the planet," said Bromberg. "By bringing in the marine water, this composition will be changed. There is concern about algae growth and we could see the sea change from deep blue to red and brown and the different waters could separate."
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Remnants of Hurricane John reach U.S.
AP
Tue Sep 5, 2006
EL PASO, Texas - Heavy rain flooded roads in the Southwest on Monday as the rapidly weakening remnants of Hurricane John spread across the border from Mexico, where up to 20 inches had fallen on parts of the Baja Peninsula.
A half-mile section of Interstate 10 near downtown El Paso was closed by water Monday morning, police spokesman Javier Sambrano said.
Normally dry southern New Mexico got enough rain to cause isolated road flooding, southern Arizona had scattered rain, and showers were possible in desert areas of Southern California through Tuesday, the U.S. National Hurricane Center said.
In Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, across the border from El Paso, rain flooded at least 20 neighborhoods, knocked down electricity poles and caused several traffic accidents. Hundreds of people were evacuated from one neighborhood because of concerns about a nearby dam that exceeded its capacity, said Luz del Carmen Sosa of the city's public safety department.
In Mexico, three people were killed across the Baja California peninsula, including a British man who died when his camper was swept away by floodwaters and two Mexicans who drowned in strong river currents, said Victor Guluarte, the state's interior secretary. A total of 160 houses on the peninsula lost their roofs and four houses collapsed, officials said.
In the El Paso area, where almost 3 inches of rain had fallen since Friday, no injuries or evacuations were reported, unlike during storms about a month ago that washed out roads and chased people out of their homes.
"We haven't seen a replay of what we saw several weeks ago," Sambrano said. "We've been very fortunate because it's actually been nonstop rain throughout the night."
A Continental Airlines jet got stuck in mud Monday at El Paso International Airport when it steered off the taxiway as it was headed toward the terminal after landing, airline spokeswoman Julie King said.
No one was hurt, other flights were not affected and passengers were shuttled to the terminal by bus. The airplane remained in the mud late Monday afternoon, and the
Federal Aviation Administration was investigating the cause of the mishap, airport spokeswoman Liz Bellegrade said.
The
National Weather Service issued flash flood watches or warnings Monday for parts of southern New Mexico and parts of West Texas and the Southern California deserts.
Carlsbad, N.M., reported curb-to-curb water on the streets from three days of rain. Several low-lying roads in the area were closed, but dispatchers said none were major thoroughfares and there were no serious problems.
In Ruidoso Downs, conditions were muddy for the running of the $2 million All American Futurity quarter horse race, the biggest day of horse racing in New Mexico.
Heavy rain on Sunday shut down the 8th annual Harvest Wine Festival in Las Cruces, N.M., the first time the festival had ever been rained out, organizers said. The Las Cruces airport reported more than 2 inches of rain in 3 hours Sunday.
John was a Category 2 hurricane with sustained wind of 110 mph when it struck near the southern tip of Baja on Friday, but officials reported only minor damage. The area hardest hit was La Paz, the capital of Baja California del Sur state.
"Fortunately there is no human loss and the impact (in terms of damage) is relatively modest," Mexico President
Vicente Fox said Sunday as he toured the city and pledged to help residents whose homes had been damaged.
By early Monday, the storm's maximum sustained wind had slowed to about 30 mph, well below the 39 mph threshold for a tropical storm, as it slowly moved northwestward up the spine of the narrow Baja Peninsula.
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